Google Privacy Case: Google It has once again come into controversies. A US court found the company guilty of violation of privacy rules and fined $ 425 million (about Rs 3,540 crore). It is alleged that Google tracked their data without the permission of the users and recorded online activities.
In this case, the court found that Google kept recording their online activities despite users trekking off. The case was registered in 2020 as a class-action case. The petitioners claimed that Google did not follow the privacy rules given in its web & app activity settings.
About 9.8 crore users and 17.4 crore devices were affected in this case. In the initial stages, the petitioners sought more than $ 31 billion from Google.
The US Federal Court said in its judgment that Google has violated 2 out of 3 privacy rules. Although the court also admitted that the company did not do so intentionally, its practices were against the promises made to users.
This tracking of Google was not limited to its platform only, but was spread to the apps of big companies like Uber, Lyft, Amazon, Alibaba, Instagram and Facebook. Even the data of business users using Google Analytics was being tracked. Google claims that this data was not to personal identity, but users say they were misled.
This case is not the only headache for Google. The company was already facing antitrust cases to Chrome browser and Ad-Tech Monopoly. However, Google has got partial relief in the recent decision. The court said that the company can keep its Chrome browser, but it will have to share its search data with the competitors.
It is clear that in the coming time, legal pressure on Google may increase even more, and the company will have to show more transparency regarding the privacy of users.
This huge fine on Google has once again raised the question to what extent tech companies take the data and privacy of users seriously. This case is also a strong message for other companies that the price of privacy violations may be very expensive.
