Google has agreed to pay $93 million to the state of California, settling a lawsuit that accused the tech giant of misleading consumers about its location tracking practices.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta made the announcement Thursday, saying the lawsuit accused Google of creating an illusion for consumers, leading them to believe they had control over data collection and usage methods. of the company California’s argument was that even if users turned off the “Location History” setting, Google could still “profile” people, targeting them with personalized ads. Additionally, the state claimed the company had not been transparent about users’ abilities to avoid unwanted ads.
The agreement calls for several measures to strengthen user privacy. Google will now have to be more transparent about its location tracking methods and how the collected data is used.
Rob Bonta commented on the situation and stated: “Google promised users that they would not be tracked if they opted out. However, they went against that guarantee, tracking users for commercial profit. This kind of conduct is simply unacceptable.” It’s worth noting that Google did not admit any wrongdoing as part of the terms of the settlement.
In the first half of 2023, Google’s advertising revenue reached a staggering $110.9 billion, contributing 81% of its total revenue of $137.7 billion.
Google has settled similar allegations in the past. Last November, the company agreed to a $391.5 million settlement to address similar concerns raised by 40 US states. While some states like California chose separate lawsuits, others like Arizona and Washington have already settled. In response to the latest settlement, a Google representative pointed to an earlier blog post about the multi-state settlement, highlighting changes made to outdated product policies.
This article is sourced from and written by AI.
Track and stay informed about AI-generated news:
Español de Venezuela 
English 