Google Maps Street View captures buildings, people and more as it maps the world. When the tech giant wants to protect privacy it will blur out people’s faces and personal details such as number plates and house numbers. Sometimes, however, there appears to be no explanation for why Google Maps has hidden certain scenes. This is certainly for the case for this one house in Stockton-on-Tees in County Durham.
The UK house appears to be on the perfectly normal street of Princeport Road and the building itself doesn’t look to be out of the ordinary.
Nevertheless, Google seems to have decided the public should not be able to view the house.
The property is completely hidden from view as Google has blurred out the place.
Is there a reason the tech giant does not want the property to be seen? Is there a dark secret lurking there?
For those keen for an intriguing tale, there is sadly no obvious reason for the blurring out.
In fact, even the resident in the property doesn’t understand why Street View has hidden the building.
Jane Allison told The Sun: ”I’ve been in this house since 2000 but I have no idea why you can’t see it. If you find out it would be nice to know why.”
The house is far from the only place on Google Maps that has sparked interest in why it is blurred.
For instance, there is an area in northern France where the quality of the image suddenly deteriorates after being blurred out.
The place in question is a nuclear reprocessing plant at La Hague in Normandy.
The AREVA La Hague site was opened in 1976 and it treats spent nuclear fuel from France, Japan, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands.
The site has attracted a fair amount of controversy over the years, and criticism from Greenpeace in particular.
They have been campaigning for the plant to be shut down since 1997.
The La Hague nuclear reprocessing plant is most likely blurred from view due to security.
The Ayioi Anargyroi Military Base Athens in Greece is also so heavily blurred out no Google user can look at it.
Many governmental or military centres are censored by Google Maps for security reasons.
However, there are occasions when Google’s decision to hide something is due to a horrifying reason.
For instance, Google has blurred out the house where notorious kidnapper and sexual offender Ariel Castro kept three innocent women locked up for a decade.
After Castro was incarcerated, Google proceeded to blur out the house where the horrors had taken place.