How to blur your home on Google Maps
AUSTIN, Texas - Technology is a great tool to help people find their way around, but it also gives criminals a view of your home. Some homeowners are taking action to try to protect their property.
"Burglars are actually using technology to their advantage," Criminologist Alex del Carmen said.
One piece of technology they utilize is Google Maps.
"To see the dimensions of the house, the proximity from the street to the front door. And they're even able to see the three-dimensional perspective from the side," del Carmen said.
Del Carmen said, by the time they get to your house, they know how to get in and how to get out.
Homeowners are now taking action to protect themselves from those potentially prying eyes.
"The idea is, is you make the target harder to achieve," del Carmen said.
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They are blurring their homes on Google Maps. To do so, find your property in the street view, in the lower right corner, click "report a problem", and a screen appears offering to "blur" an image. You’ll have to provide an email address and Google to consider the request. The blurring is permanent.
"I only see advantages to doing that in the context of being able to prevent bad guys from being able to see it and burglarize your home," del Carmen said.
He said if it happens once, it will very likely happen again.
"If criminals are able to get these pictures and get them online and even produce them in the dark web and distribute them to other criminals, this can then become a habit for them because they know that that particular target is easy to penetrate," del Carmen said.
The Austin Police Department recorded 996 burglaries in the first quarter of this year. That is down compared to the same time period every year since 2020.