Tuesday, November 22, 2022
In what is considered the largest privacy-related settlement in history, Google will pay $391.5 million to 40 states to settle an investigation by 40 state attorneys general. The bipartisan coalition of attorneys general alleged that Google misled users into believing that opting out of sharing their location data prevented the company from tracking users' locations. But even when users opted out of location tracking, researchers confirmed that Google nonetheless tracked user location data across a number of its services, including its search tool, maps, and applications. The practices, which occurred between 2014 and 2020, violated consumer protection statutes that prohibit misleading and deceiving consumers, the attorneys general said. Among the consumer protection statutes that were violated according to the investigation were New York General Business Law Sections 349 and 350 and Massachusetts General Law Chapter 93A.