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Ask HN: Can you help me remove the marks for the airstrikes from Google Maps?
My hometown, which I left on the 14th, so far has been safe.
But it's about to change. Today I stumbled upon information about supposed marks for the airstrikes on Google Maps.
I tried cheking information myself and found it very believable. Replicate as follows:
1. Search for Dnipro on Google Maps
2. Enter фермерське господарство (means farm on Ukrainian, but there are no farms there) in search
3. Do not press enter and look for auto-complete: Those are supposed targets.
Those marks are unusual: you can’t even report them. I never seen anything like this.
Video demonstration here:
https://youtu.be/OHGsFCfuB_k
This may save lives, including people I know. That’s why I need your help.
Important Edit: I have to clarify that in my opinion these are more probably marks for saboteurs to make real-world marks on the specified locations.
Examples here: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/russia-invades-ukraine-secret-symbols-seen-in-ukraine-point-to-escalation-of-violence/ZRZPD5W7WRAWD3U32C4PHB273I/
- hogrider 5y agoHow the fuck is google still serving Russians?
- marius_k 5y agoDoes anyone know why google maps is used here? Could it be trolling? To make people busy doing useless work?
- jim180 5y agoIf the tweet[0] tells the truth, it might be the case, that Russian military does not have any other choice. [0] https://twitter.com/sbreakintl/status/1498619303717142529?s=21 https://twitter.com/sbreakintl/status/1498619303717142529?s=...
- tempestn 5y agoWhy would Russia mark airstrikes with some kind of obfuscated Google Maps entries? I hope your hometown stays safe, but I can't see how this makes sense.
- spacemanmatt 5y ago$cheap
- Kaotique 5y agoAny agent/soldier can access it without a complicated permission or authorization structure. You don't need access to some spy satellite. All you need is a mobile phone, tablet or laptop. It would seem very effective to me.
- masklinn 5y agoNot to mention the entire logistics side seem to have broken down entirely so coms and digital services being out / unavailable would be… unsurprising.
- bob66 5y ago
- codedokode 5y agoThese marks could be set by ukrainian citizens wanting to return the glorious days of Soviet Union.
- rocqua 5y agoIts easy for local collaborators/spies to use this kind of system for communication with the Russian army. No special skills or tools needed, and the on-line behavior is really hard to distinguish from 'expected' behavior. Its a pretty nice, and really easy to use, covert channel.
- zihotki 5y agoThere is a saying in Russia, at war all measures and ways are good (на войне все средства хороши). Whatever can be used will be used either due to convenience, due to malice, or due to any other reason.
- 55555 5y agoProbably not.
- ketralnis 5y agoIt feels very improbable that a government would be using google maps for this. It feels even more improbable that even if they are, removing a mark from google maps would prevent them from launching an actual air strike. Surely a target important enough to "mark" would be worth finding an alternative way to target in case a bunch of keyboard warriors figure out your nefarious plan. None of this makes sense. I know it feels good to feel like you're helping but I think you're being trolled by assholes on the internet.
- invalidname 5y agoAs far as I understand the Russian equipment is awful and unmaintained. As a result soldiers in the field just use cell phones and Google Maps to coordinate. Yes they have the original military equipment as the source of the commands but it's much easier to communicate via cell phones. If you know Russians this makes 100% perfect sense... The solution isn't to remove it. Just move the locations slightly to an empty field nearby.
- Piskvorrr 5y agoGiven the accuracy of the Russian artillery and rockets seen so far, "move it slightly" is a no-op.
- invalidname 5y agoSlightly is subjective. It can be 10 miles or more. But if you remove it they will notice... I worked for a company that worked with maps and our local authorities came over and asked us to move the locations of the bases just a bit. We did that. The logic is that they already know the base is there. Just move it a bit and if it looks close enough they will get small things wrong. If it's too much they won't make the mistake of relying on the bad information.
- mellavora 5y agoI read something about a 40 mile long logistics convoy.... might be more interesting to put markers on that road than on an empty field.
- hedora 5y agoOther commenters in other threads say that these marks are placed by civilians working on behalf of the Russian government. It makes some sense. No software is needed, and traffic analysis looking for spies is unlikely to flag https requests to google maps. Also, Russian owned map services are supposedly blocked in Ukraine. Some people claim to have worked with Russia in this way for anti-isis strikes in syria. At the very least, they are defacement, and google should pull them. Hopefully someone from their maps abuse team will take a look. HN search of articles in the last 24 hours should find the comments I’m referring to.
- Maxious 5y ago> “Out of an abundance of caution, we are removing user contributions like photos, videos, reviews and business information and all user-submitted places from Google Maps in Ukraine, Russia and Belarus since the invasion began, and are temporarily blocking new edits from being made,” a Google spokesperson said. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/sarahemerson/russia-google-maps-tags-ukraine https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/sarahemerson/russia-goo...
- geoka9 5y agoIt still works, I've just tried.
- axiosgunnar 5y agok8s takes some time to roll out on a global scale i would assume
- benatkin 5y agoIf it's an update to the Docker images, that normally takes a couple minutes, if it's a rolling deploy. It is possible to turn off the rolling deploy, but there will be downtime.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- rigelbm 5y agoGoogle uses neither k8s nor Docker internally. From my knowledge, a change like this can take anywhere from a couple of minutes to a few hours to roll globally, depending on how much support was already in place.
- Lascaille 5y ago>>If it's an update to the Docker images >Google uses neither k8s nor Docker internally. It's so weird when people just go on the internet and lie about how things work with such utter confidence. No 'I believe', no 'if things are still done that way' just pure lies typed as fact. Should be an account ban, really. (Them, not you.)
- graderjs 5y agoIf true, what would the debate within Google be like about closing Google services / blacklisting accounts or devices, over the affected regions? For such a thing they probably have to get approval from the state department or someone else correct?
- Lascaille 5y ago>For such a thing they probably have to get approval from the state department Google doesn't have to get approval from the state department to discontinue services.
- hedora 5y agoTrue, but they have strong ties to the state department, and I imagine those conversations are happening. The right strategy might be non-obvious from the outside.
- graderjs 5y agoNo I mean don't think they would, in a regular case...But for such a thing, where say it affects a target/person of interest/VIP who is under surveillance/protection, or, say in this case, where it's an action in and that directly affects a war-zone, I imagine there be such a requirement... I mean, if anything, you can imagine the situation where say CIA was doing some operation in a country, and at the same time there was some sort of mass disinformation campaign by some "enemy" actor, and Google decided to discontinue services, but that interfered with the CIA's operation somehow, maybe by cutting CIA off from intelligence and capability against the actor. So you imagine that it would be desirable there would be some co-ordination of things, to avoid stepping on toes. I mean, right? That's reasonable, isn't it?
- Rastonbury 5y agoI doubt it, the idea that Russian soldiers are using Maps to navigate in Ukraine is a PR disaster waiting to happen.
- hgomersall 5y ago
- playpause 5y agoI don’t know if this is true. But to everyone dismissing the idea that a military would ever use Google Maps to co-ordinate, you may have missed some news stories about what a shitshow the first few days of the Russian invasion has been. Major breakdown of their digital systems and lots of improvisation.
- geoka9 5y agoSame, I don't know if it's true that they are marks for Russian air strikes. But I've just tried and it does look weird (farms in the middle of the city).
- trhway 5y agobeside the large painted marks on the roofs/etc., on Ukranian TV 10 minutes ago they shown some marks which are kind of plastic stick-on 1 inch square with the same cross-in-circle image. The stick-on are reflective and have numbers. Some people think it is a mark of the houses with police, military residents, etc...
- kaetemi 5y agoThose plastic reflective stickers are supposedly local tools for land measurement.
- donavanm 5y agoDo you mean survey markers/targets? Theyre used in civil construction etc to track changes relative to an established datum https://www.berntsen.com/Surveying/Smart-Targets-Datums-Reflectors/Reflective-Tape-Targets https://www.berntsen.com/Surveying/Smart-Targets-Datums-Refl...
- trhway 5y agolooks like it. There had some time ago been warning that some civil markers may be mistaken for suspicious one, and looks like that is what happening in this case. Sent them email about these ones.
- s5300 5y agoStrap in boys, gonna be an interesting century.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- wzyoi 5y agoIn times of uncertainty I always count on worst. If chances of this true are 10% and this is indeed true, giving it some attention is worth it. Edit: by attention I mean somebody from Google who can check things up
- malloryerik 5y agoAgreed. Even a 0.1% chance makes a Google (or DoD) follow-up worth it.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tomek_zemla 5y agoIt has been noted by number of analysts that it is surprising that Ukraine still has access to Internet. Everybody expected cyber warfare to be a major part of the invasion. One of the possible explanations mentioned: Russian army and its covert operatives need it.
- malloryerik 5y agoIs the internet and electricity being on not possibly because the invaders don't have air superiority?
- dboreham 5y agoAlso packet switched networking was invented to tolerate enemy bombing.
- d82nsjk9 5y agoMakes sense, but source?
- hnlmorg 5y agoYou're being downvoted for a fair question. I wouldn't exactly cite this as a source to the GP's claim but it does still answer your question: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_switching#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_switching#History
- d82nsjk9 5y agoI guess I may have come across as rude or lazy for not googling it myself :) Thanks!
- Ennergizer 5y agoUkraine has one of the best fiber optic and cable network systems in the world built 10-15 years ago. It had mobile internet in subway station and between subway stations in 2002-2004, way before anyone in the world.
- Rastonbury 5y agoTargeting airstrikes theory aside, wonder what Google thinks of the potential that Russian soldiers are using Maps to navigate while invading Ukraine?
- qsort 5y agoI'm the exact opposite of a military expert, but the conflict being extremely asymmetric, a service like Google Maps helps the Ukranians side more than it helps the Russians.
- malloryerik 5y agoDoes it though? Maps in general help me more when I'm new somewhere. I wonder if it couldn't be helpful for Google Maps and other services to block out for example all small roads, inner cities, etc. Maybe I'm wrong though; why would maps help the defenders more?
- benatkin 5y agoIt would be nice if Google Maps would distract the invading soldiers by asking them to calibrate their accelerometers all the time like it did on my phone.
- Rastonbury 5y agoIt should not be too challenging to block services to phones originating in Russia but being used in Ukraine now.
- richarme 5y agoIndeed. Cell phones are by definition location tracking devices so data can be routed to the right place. Ukrainian mobile network operators should be able to figure out the exact movement of every single soldier carrying a regular phone, and selectively block service at opportune moments. More trivially, wouldn't they be using russian SIM cards?
- thatjoeoverthr 5y agoIf it’s real intel, forward it. Let them think it’s secret.
- salzig 5y agoHow about adding reviews to those places that tell the truth about the whole situation? Looks like it could get to the right people.
- pythonlion 5y agoalso google probably should delete all new entries from Ukraine or review them manually. if deleting all of them is difficult for users maybe maybe op want to create falses? idk
- waffleiron 5y agoYesterday’s discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30516996 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30516996
- VaxWithSex 5y agoWe could run Ads: Tired of Starting a War on your Brother-nation? Apply for political Asylum in Europe now!
- yetihehe 5y agoFrom what I've heard from some russians, there are already such ads wherever possible.
- KerryJones 5y agoGoogle employee here, though not on the maps team, I just raised it internally to look into (please continue to try to make edits, I don't know when it will be seen)
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- wzyoi 5y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30528022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30528022
- KerryJones 5y agoThanks for the follow up
- jonathanstrange 5y agoI think decision makers from the Ukrainian military should get into touch with Google before anything is done, since there is a distinct possibility that removing these markers is a bad idea. Even if they are used for real targeting, they can also be used to warn civilians and the respective installations of upcoming strikes or sabotage actions. Besides, if they really need the marks, they will not stop shooting when they disappear, they will instead more likely shell indiscriminately to show their superiors they're fulfilling their objectives. I don't know if these considerations are relevant but would urge OP to contact someone in Ukraine about it.
- rocqua 5y agoThis is an un-authenticated method of communication. It might be hard to stop people from using this, but it seems easy to overwhelm them with misinformation. Start placing 10, or a hundred times as many of these signs around non-important objects. Drown the signal in noise. Some consideration is needed for how to keep these symbols believable, without accidentally marking certain people for being bombed. Still, I think if you have marked 60% of roofs in a town with these signs, then some-one will realize something is wrong.
- GTP 5y agoI was trying to check if this is happening also on OpenStreetMap, I searched for "фермерське господарство" which returned results in Ukraine, but I wasn't able to restrict them to a single city so I don't know if those are actual farms or not. Somebody who knows OpenStreetMap better could check this?
- habi 5y agoOverpass Turbo [1] is the search for OSM data. One can search for partial key-value combinations. When searching for `name:фермерське` around Kyiv, I only find one instance: https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1gBr https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1gBr Generalising the search for `*=фермерське` does not yield much more (around Kyiv, for example): https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1gBA https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1gBA You can pan and zoom the map and repeat the search with the 'Run' button on the top left, but I often get a time-out when searching for regions spanning more than ~50 km. [1]: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Overpass_turbo https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Overpass_turbo
- maxerickson 5y agoTry [landuse~"farm"] (which will match several different types).
- habi 5y agoSure, I specifically only included the Ukrainian name.
- maxerickson 5y agoThe OSM data model is pretty free form, checking for things marked in one particular way wouldn't really rule out the system being used for coordination.
- AriedK 5y agoWhy is this immediately attributed to Russian troops as markers? Couldn't it also be Ukrainian movements using this for their organization? 'Farms' being code for supply houses?
- itronitron 5y agoIf that were the case they should still be removed from Google Maps since the locations are correlated with later airstrikes. From the linked Buzzfeed article: >> “The tags in Google Maps were created on Feb 28th, and people noticed that the tags match the places the missile strikes today,”
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- sdfgdfghj 5y agoI remember reports on the first night of the invasion of a traffic jam from Crimea towards Ukraine. It was 2-3am local time. Makes me wonder how many Russian troops sneaked in personal devices.
- dsomers 5y agoI don’t think google maps info was ever close to 100% reliable anywhere. Once in midtown Toronto there was a giant hole where google maps said a bank was, they where building a condo there. I thought I’d be helpful and submit a correction to the map — I later got a notification my correction was not accepted and they kept the ghost bank there years after it was gone. There’s also no way they could reasonably think I was a spammer because I had a decades old google account that existed within months of gmail existing. They probably know what I’ve eaten every day for the past 20 years. That’s all to say, google is a giant machine, and if it decides your version of reality is wrong, don’t bother, no human on their side will probably ever look at it because humans are expensive.
- merek 5y agoTo clarify, are you suggesting these are unusual because "farms" are being marked in urban areas? What is the possibility these are simply addresses of farming-related businesses (e.g. farm equipment suppliers)? (comment cannot be removed, only edited)
- abliefern 5y agoAmazing, OP asks for help removing this information from the internet and you replicate it here for safekeeping.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- mmsbdjjkvjj 5y agoPlease remove this post
- curl-up 5y agoOP, why do you think a farm business (which gmaps are showing the location of) should be in the same place where farm land is? These simply seem to be the addresses where a "farm business" is registered, as can be confirmed on a company-info-aggregator site [1]. I assume, in a lot of cases (especially for family owned farms), these are actually homes of the owners, to simplify all the mail and other paperwork. Actual farms can be located anywhere, probably outside of town. It might even be multiple farms (multiple pieces of land). To answer your point about why these seem different (e.g. you cannot report them), I think it's because they are automatically scraped by google from the official company-info sites in each country. Seems to be a similar situation in other countries, as far as I can tell. [1] this is the info of the first item on gmaps I get - address matches the location I'm shown https://youcontrol.com.ua/catalog/company_details/21897611/ https://youcontrol.com.ua/catalog/company_details/21897611/
- wzyoi 5y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30528022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30528022 thank you
- social_quotient 5y agoIf this is really a thing why would google not probably know about it first and second why would google not just hide everything but roads views for a temporary period. No sat views, no places, nothing but roads. If you want to be fancy maybe roads and gas stations and food. It seems like out of an abundance of caution you would not want your service to be used for this. Same for bing and other maps. Am I missing something here?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- venkat223 5y agoGoogle should remove such maps retrspectively.
- RamblingCTO 5y agolooks like free OSINT for UA. could also be used for trolling (set markers on russian forces) if true
- CodeWriter23 5y agoDefinitely remove this information that may be used by civilians to leave hot zones prior to attack. I cannot believe this level of lack of insight from a group of people who call themselves engineers.
- wzyoi 5y agotldr: false alarm, unclear google I'm back to process info and make edits. I couldn't stay online due to injured hands from gadgets overuse. > OP, why do you think a farm business (which gmaps are showing the location of) should be in the same place where farm land is? These simply seem to be the addresses where a "farm business" is registered, as can be confirmed on a company-info-aggregator site [1]. I assume, in a lot of cases (especially for family owned farms), these are actually homes of the owners, to simplify all the mail and other paperwork. Actual farms can be located anywhere, probably outside of town. It might even be multiple farms (multiple pieces of land). To answer your point about why these seem different (e.g. you cannot report them), I think it's because they are automatically scraped by google from the official company-info sites in each country. Seems to be a similar situation in other countries, as far as I can tell. [1] this is the info of the first item on gmaps I get - address matches the location I'm shown https://youcontrol.com.ua/catalog/company_details/21897611/ https://youcontrol.com.ua/catalog/company_details/21897611/ curl-up was right - these are all addresses of legally registered farms and they are Googlable. I did not think about googling the names or how farms are registered or why Google has such weird marks. I thought they are similar because it's the way to find them and not because they are from one trusted source. Also, all marks I've seen were close to Russian troops. But the only border of Dnipro that's completely safe is west. Google parses open data. I was not aware of that. Thanks for the help and sorry for the wasted resources. P.S. Those marks still look weird nevertheless. Not reportable or edible. The only article they link to is useless. Maybe it's worth fixing. I'm out of resources (hands) to continue typing. Thank you all <3
- curl-up 5y agoVery happy to have been able to help, and thanks for broadcasting my post :) Your theory actually sounded very plausible to me, which is why it peaked my interest so much. I hope we're able to "crowdsource" and inspect future similar cases as well. I wish best of luck in these difficult times.
- wzyoi 5y agoToo bad I can't edit the post anymore because it got unlisted. I think it's too hard to notice parent comment. Maybe mods could pin it? @dang