Google to shut down editing in Map Maker following the peeing Android fiasco

Just a few weeks ago, a “clever” Google Maps user submitted an image of the Android mascot urinating on an Apple logo in Google Maps, forcing Google to apologize for the mishap. Most folks out there thought this stunt was childish and inappropriate, and apparently Google Maps has seen an escalated number of spam submissions, thanks to the auto-approval process in Map Maker. Because this rate has been growing so quickly, Google has suspended auto-approval and user moderation across the globe in Map Maker, at least until the company figures out how to more intelligently prevent these types of incidents.

Pavithra Kanakarajan, Product Manager at Google Map Maker, explains:

As some of you know already, we have been experiencing escalated attacks to spam Google Maps over the past few months. The most recent incident was particularly troubling and unfortunate – a strong user in our community chose to go and create a large scale prank on the Map. As a consequence, we suspended auto-approval and user moderation across the globe, till we figured out ways to add more intelligent mechanisms to prevent such incidents.

All of our edits are currently going through a manual review process.

Editing in Map Maker will be disabled starting Tuesday, May 12th, 2015 (tomorrow).

Of course, Google shutting down the auto-approval process is meant to make the program more professional and accurate. We’re not sure when a fix will be published, but we’ll be sure to let you know when the improved tool will return back online.