Google says it inadvertently sucked up fragments of e-mails, search requests and other online data over public Wi-Fi networks in more than 30 countries while photographing neighborhoods for its “Street View” mapping feature. Google said it was all a mistake, and the company is profoundly sorry for the error.

Google said that it collects SSID information as well as the MAC addresses of WiFi routers it encounters along the Street View route. This is for use in Google’s location-based services, like Skyhook Wireless‘ services that are widely used on mobile devices without GPS. It didn’t mean to record payload data.

But three U.S. congressmen aren’t buying it. Representative Henry Waxman of California, Representative Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Representative Joe Barton of Texas on Friday posted Google’s response to their queries online (pdf) and said they continue to be concerned about the activity.

Meanwhile Google is attempting to consolidate the growing number of lawsuits against the company as a result of its WiFi data collection. Google wants all the cases consolidated into one, and for that single case to be heard by a court near its Mountain View, California, headquarters.

A privacy group has analyzed an independent analysis of the situation and is now accusing Google of having “criminal intent”. Privacy International says the independent report (PDF) conducted by technical services firm Stroz Friedberg details what kind of data Google’s code did and did not collect, as well as how it was processed and stored.

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