Google Gets Hit With a New Lawsuit Over 'Deceptive' Location Tracking (techcrunch.com) 23
Washington DC, Texas, Washington state and Indiana announced the latest lawsuit against Big Tech Monday, alleging that Google deceived users by collecting their location data even when they believed that kind of tracking was disabled. TechCrunch reports: "Google falsely led consumers to believe that changing their account and device settings would allow customers to protect their privacy and control what personal data the company could access," DC Attorney General Karl Racine said. "The truth is that contrary to Google's representations it continues to systematically surveil customers and profit from customer data." Racine described Google's privacy practices as "bold misrepresentations" that undermine consumer privacy. His office began investigating how Google handles user location data after reporting from the Associated Press in 2018 found that many Google apps across iOS and Android recorded location data even when users have chosen privacy options that explicitly say they won't. The AP coordinated with computer science researchers at Princeton to verify its findings.
The lawsuit argues that Google created a location tracking system that's impossible for users to opt out of and that it misled users about how privacy settings could protect their data within apps and at the device level on Android. It also accuses Google of relying on deceptive dark pattern design to force users into making choices counter to their own interests. Racine's office is pursuing an injunction against Google as well as seeking to force the company to pay out profits that it made from user data collected by misleading consumers about their privacy.
The lawsuit argues that Google created a location tracking system that's impossible for users to opt out of and that it misled users about how privacy settings could protect their data within apps and at the device level on Android. It also accuses Google of relying on deceptive dark pattern design to force users into making choices counter to their own interests. Racine's office is pursuing an injunction against Google as well as seeking to force the company to pay out profits that it made from user data collected by misleading consumers about their privacy.
I see (Score:2)
People want Google to return all "Pizzeria Napoli" of the planet but the one in the same town that they look for is on page 871?
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Maybe. Does Google offer that option?
If not, couldn't they return the relevant results without keeping a history of the user's location?
If not, couldn't they keep that history without selling it?
If not, couldn't they stop doing that for users that ask them to?
If not, couldn't they tell the truth about not stopping?
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If not, couldn't they tell the truth about not stopping?
Really the only one of those that is relevant.
I don't begrudge any business its business. If they're in the business of selling information about me to creeps- I mean marketing engines- I mean departments, that's fine.
However, giving an option to disable location tracking to fraudulently impart a sense of privacy is very much against the law. Except that I'm sure it's spelled out "clearly" in their EULA. So to the courts with it. I hope they get the shit slapped out of them, though.
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"Maybe. Does Google offer that option?"
In their FREE OS? Do you want your money back?
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If only... (Score:1)
If only there was some way to specify the location you wanted in a search query.
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"If only there was some way to specify the location you wanted in a search query."
Indeed, it would be great if you could enter 'Pizzeria Napoli' 'Buttfuck, Idaho'.
This is one of my many grievances with Google (Score:4)
When Google says "We promise not to...", you have to take them at your word. No authority is monitoring what they do with their data; the weasel is guarding the hen house.
In 2014, Google was sued [theguardian.com] when it was discovered they were scanning student e-mail data for marketing purposes, a violation of student data privacy laws. In response, Google promised not to do it again [theguardian.com]. Which begs the question: Why were they doing it in the first place? And it also begs another question: Does anybody know for certain whether they have stopped?
And everybody knows, including Google, that this lawsuit will get settled out of court without any admission of guilt for a fine equivalent to what Google profits in one hour of operation. There's never any real punishment that stings when it comes to state or federal lawsuits.
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Indeed. I'm reminded of that quote from Fight Club:
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No authority is monitoring what they do with their data; the weasel is guarding the hen house.
Well, only the FTC. Pursuant to the 2011 consent decree, Google is required to perform regular independent privacy audits, which the FTC reviews. You can argue about whether this is sufficient, of course, but it's not true that no authority is monitoring them. The consent decree will remain in effect until 2031.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Google_Inc. [wikipedia.org]
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independent privacy audits
Good one!
It's what the FTC requires. I'm not sure what you're trying to imply.
You can de-google your life (Score:3)
Search with DuckDuckGo [duckduckgo.com]. Carry an iphone (or better, a dumbphone. Of if you must, a de-googled [nolanlawson.com] android phone). Paid-for email only costs a couple of bucks a month (through such services as fastmail [fastmail.com] or protonmail or others), but if you are too cheap for even that you can get free email from Microsoft [live.com], with promises not to read it and spy on you. And you can get your free office tools here [libreoffice.org] or maybe here [openoffice.org] or here [microsoft.com].
Google holds no power us but what we freely choose to give them.
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This is good advice, except I've tried and tried to default my search tool to DuckDuckGo and every single time, I wind up using Google instead because DuckDuckGo just isn't returning enough relevant results.
It's probably fine for your general purpose searches? But I'm typically searching on really specific things, like putting in a model or part number, or even an FCC ID number to identify an electronic component. Other times, I'm just searching for whatever info I can find on a specific name or phone numbe
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The issue is a common one for Google - the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. They end up with a confusing, and in this case misleading, UI.
There is a setting to disable "Location History". Sounds like it will stop all tracking of location, but actually it only stops that data being associated with your Google account. Other apps, including Google ones, are free to collect and store that data if they have the location permission.
"bold misrepresentations"? (Score:3)
I'm glad DC's AG is going after Google, but I do wish he'd drop the polite language and call it lying. Google lies, and has done so repeatedly and frequently. Calling it "misrepresentation" makes it sound more innocuous than it is. Google are evil liars - no politeness nor civility should figure in stating that plain, simple fact.
I wonder ... (Score:1)
Had someone followed workers to the Lockheed Martin Advanced Development Project faciliti
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Explain to me why Julian Assange is in prison but Sundar Pichai is still a free man.
Julian Assange didn't have a terabit fiber pipeline from his data center to the NSA's?
Good news (Score:1)
really? (Score:2)
I'm no fan of Google, but "...dark pattern design to force users into making choices counter to their own interests..." sounds suspiciously like something we'd hear at the Salem witch trials.
Look, I get it. If one is a colossal egoist having trouble understanding anyone that disagrees with you, it's easier to take human agency out of the discussion.
- people smoke, do drugs
- people spend their money on stupid crap
- people vote for candidates you don't like
- people aren't afraid of things you are afraid of .
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I'm no fan of Google, but "...dark pattern design to force users into making choices counter to their own interests..." sounds suspiciously like something we'd hear at the Salem witch trials.
This is per the standard American playbook, if you want to argue against something, you must first make it a scary enemy and get dramatic headlines. "I'd like to be able to fix my own car." "'Right to Repair' will allow rapists to follow your wife home with your car's GPS!"
Look, I get it. If one is a colossal egoist having trouble understanding anyone that disagrees with you, it's easier to take human agency out of the discussion.
...
Agreed, but what Google is doing WRT personal agency might be analogous to sneaking small amounts of coke into someone's cigarettes in order to build up an addiction -- the user is consciously accepting one thing, but getting a little ex
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Completely agree. And to be clear, I'm absolutely not exonerating the company whose (former) mantra was basically 'don't be a dick'... (those days are long, long past).
I think however that we've accepted such overwhelming collection of even trivial data that EVEN IF you were able to insist that Google NOT-TRACK you, you basically could then be tracked /anyway/ by inference, almost like watching for stellar background occlusions to identify planets.
In short, I believe that the data-collection genie has long