Google Sued After Cellular Data Allowances Eaten by Hidden Transfers

An anonymous reader shares a report: Google was sued last week for allegedly stealing Android users' cellular data allowances through unapproved, undisclosed transmissions to the web giant's servers. The lawsuit, Taylor et al v. Google, was filed in a US federal district court in San Jose on behalf of four plaintiffs based in Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin in the hope the case will be certified by a judge as a class action. The complaint contends that Google is using Android users' limited cellular data allowances without permission to transmit information about those individuals that's unrelated to their use of Google services. Data sent over Wi-Fi is not at issue, nor is data sent over a cellular connection in the absence of Wi-Fi when an Android user has chosen to use a network-connected application. What concerns the plaintiffs is data sent to Google's servers that isn't the result of deliberate interaction with a mobile device -- we're talking passive or background data transfers via cell network, here. "Google designed and implemented its Android operating system and apps to extract and transmit large volumes of information between Plaintiffs' cellular devices and Google using Plaintiffs' cellular data allowances," the complaint claims. "Google's misappropriation of Plaintiffs' cellular data allowances through passive transfers occurs in the background, does not result from Plaintiffs' direct engagement with Google's apps and properties on their devices, and happens without Plaintiffs' consent." The allegation: "The device, stationary, with all apps closed, transferred data to Google about 16 times an hour, or about 389 times in 24 hours. Assuming even half of that data is outgoing, Google would receive about 4.4MB per day or 130MB per month in this manner per device subject to the same test conditions."

I can see why there's so much data transmission

[SuperKendall]

It's easy to see why there's so much data transmission going on, it's all a matter of duplication [slashdot.org]...

Re:

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

Slashdot is a bit young to be suffering from Alzheimers, but the evidence is there for all to see.

Again?

[apoc.famine]

That's the second time in the last three days [slashdot.org] they've been sued for this!

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[wakeboarder]

The story mods don't read slashdot.

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[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

What happened to Story Tags? In the past this story would have been attributed the "Dupe" tag but it's gone.

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[rahvin112]

Lawyers sense money. Any settlement will mostly go to the lawyers, not the plaintiffs.

These data transfers are agreed to in the TOS when you agree to tailored ad's and location awareness. I expect once all the click-wrap contracts are brough to court the suits will be dismissed.

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[rtb61]

As long as it fucks over the cunts at Google and stop this bullshit, a job well done. Bleed the fuckers and bleed them hard. The TOS does not work post purchase in most countries only in the most corrupt states in the US can a contract be forced after the purchase of the product, as corrupt as corrupt can be, you can even continue to change that contract, add in organ donor clause and there are corrupt states in the USA that would enforce it.

we will pay ".002 cents per KB.

[Joe_Dragon]

we will pay ".002 cents per KB.

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[bn-7bc]

Ouch that is $2000/GB i knew mobule data was exspensive in some pkaces ( maybe esp overage) but holy crap, even data roaming in the us ( I’m from norway)cost about $22/GB if you pre pay for a 1 GB package valid for a week. That is still about 1/90th of the price you cuoted— hmm you might have ment MB instead of KB, in that case never mind

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[maglor_83]

.002 cents, not $0.002, which works out to be pretty close to your $22/GB

Telemetry intrusion boom

[Malays2 bowman]

Good. Now if they would go after every Tom, Dick, and Harry who feels the need to spy on us and sell us out, we would be getting somewhere.

I hope the information brokerage economy bubble bursts, and these sleeze bags will have to resort to boosting car stereos for their next crack-cocaine fix.

The moment an ad breaks in to

[oldgraybeard]

any streamed music I am listening to. I go back to only listening to what I have in hand. TBH all streaming is killing itself with ads. I have already dropped most video streaming because of the ads. It is hard to watch anything with all the ads they insert.

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[TheSunborn]

What are you talking about? Spotify newer inserts any adds in the stream*.

*Unless you are to cheap to pay for the subscription, but in that case you get what you pay for.

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[bn-7bc]

Hmm this might vary country to country or service to service, or any combination there of, at least on Netfilx and prime video (or what ever Amazon decides to call it this week), here in Norway i see no ads ( well ok a preroll for upcoming originals on some Amazon conrent, but iirc nothing on Netflux, and most if the other services you have in the us/EU we don’t gete her due to reasons, so I can’t comment on them. Hold on I allso gave a pi-holemight that be a contributing factor?

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[Rockoon]

The worst kind of ad nonsense is currently when watching youtube on something without an ad blocker, where some of the *inserted* advertisements are tens of minutes. Yes, they can be skipped, but only if the device thats playing it is near enough to you to manually do that.

If it was a preroll ad then you would have been ready to skip it, but they insert this 10+ minute advertisement into the middle of what you want to watch/listen to.