Alphabet will have to pay $425 million for privacy infringement

A federal jury on Wednesday ordered Alphabet, Google’s parent company, to pay $425 million for invading user privacy by continuing to collect data from millions of users. Who had disabled a tracking feature in their Google accounts.

The verdict follows a trial in San Francisco federal court over allegations that Google. Over an eight-year period, accessed users’ mobile devices to collect, store, and use their data, violating privacy safeguards under the company’s «Web & App Activity» settings.

Plaintiffs had demanded damages exceeding $31 billion.

Two of the three claims of privacy violations made by the plaintiffs were determined to be true by the jury. Google is not entitled to punitive damages because the jury found that the company did not behave deliberately.

The decision was verified by a Google representative. The business had denied any misconduct.

A class-action lawsuit, which was filed in July 2020, claimed that Google’s partnership with apps that use specific Google analytics services, like as Uber, Venmo, and Meta’s Instagram, allowed it to continue collecting user data even after the setting was off.

The case, which involves about 98 million Google users and 174 million devices, was certified as a class action by U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg.

Google settled a lawsuit alleging it tracked users who believed they were browsing quietly, including in «Incognito» mode, in April 2024 by agreeing to delete billions of information concerning users’ private browsing habits.

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