Google has admitted, in response to numerous complaints, that its Street View cars did gather information from unsecured wi-fi networks, but insists it made no use of the information and has now deleted it from its databases.

The Privacy Commissioner has laid a complaint with the Police, and the National Cyber Crime Centre is to investigate.

Assistant Privacy Commissioner Katrine Evans issued the following statement: "We have met with the New Zealand Police this afternoon. We have agreed that we will now refer this matter formally to them, so that they can consider whether Google has committed a criminal offence by collecting payload data from wi-fi networks during its Street View filming.

"We will continue to consider the privacy angles, but we have no further comment to make at this time."