Possible solutions could include delaying the public release of photos (as done in Latvia), blurring image content (like in Finland) or granting access to more detailed views only after users authenticate through a state-recognized channel, Chancellor of Justice Ülle Madise wrote in a letter to the minister of economic affairs and the director general of the Land and Spatial Development Board.

"If new high-resolution photos were not published immediately but only after a certain delay, it would not be possible to track the condition of people's homes or property too precisely. At the same time, the public would still have access to sufficiently up-to-date data," the chancellor explained.

In Madise's view, the state should not stop collecting high-quality geospatial data, but the current practice of making it publicly available needs to be reviewed. That means orthophotos and oblique aerial images should be published with greater regard for fundamental rights and a distinction must be made between data used for fulfilling state functions and data made freely available to everyone.

Several homeowners have contacted the chancellor of justice with concerns that the Land and Spatial Development Board is publishing high-resolution orthophotos (top-down images) and oblique aerial photos (angled images) on the Estonian geoportal, showing private homes, yards and moveable property in great detail. The chancellor was asked to assess whether making such images public complies with the Constitution.

"The photos are so detailed that you can identify garden hoses, paving stones, robotic lawnmowers and tools in people's yards," Madise noted. "People are worried about security risks because the photos are freely downloadable, and the level of detail could provide useful information to malicious actors. No one is obligated to share their private life with the public or tolerate curiosity-driven interest in parts of their property that aren't visible from the street."

License plate numbers, laundry hanging on a clothesline and even the interior of some homes through their windows can be seen in the images.

State-produced and published photos are significantly more accurate than those found on platforms like Google Maps, which have already raised legitimate safety concerns among the public, Madise added.

The Land and Spatial Development Board regularly conducts aerial photography across Estonia. Each year, roughly half of the country's territory is photographed from the air, alternating between northern and southern regions. Major population centers are photographed annually.

Thanks to technological advances, geospatial data has become significantly more detailed.

In respnse to the Chancellor of Justice's criticism, Kati Tamtik, director general of of the Land and Spatial Development Board, said that they plan to implement all three of the solutions proposed.

Tamtik, told ERR the Chancellor Justice's assessments did not come as a surprise, as the Land and Spatial Development Board had approached both the chancellor and the Data Protection Inspectorate in the spring to inform them about the new equipment and very accurate data.

"We have been discussing this with various authorities for six months and have not yet made this year's data public because we want to resolve the issue of how accurate the data should be before it is made public," Tamtik said.

"This data is very necessary for mapping, but the question is that if we make this data public, we have already discussed toning down the resolution. Perhaps it is too precise," Tamtik admitted.

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