Google is handing over $135 million to settle a massive class-action lawsuit with Android users. A group of people sued the tech giant, claiming it spent years harvesting their cellular data without asking for permission. They say this has been going on since late 2017, even when users thought they had their privacy features turned on.
According to the lawsuit, Google grabbed data from phones purchased through carriers. It didn’t matter if the users closed their apps or turned off their location settings; the data still flowed to Google’s servers. The plaintiffs argued this was “conversion,” which is a legal term for when one person takes someone else’s property and treats it as their own. In this case, users felt Google stole their private information to improve its own marketing and products.
If a federal judge in San Jose approves the deal, it will be one of the biggest payouts ever for a privacy case. Glen Summers, a lawyer for the users, noted that the $135 million figure is one of the largest totals in history for this type of dispute. Individual users involved in the case could see up to $100 each.
While Google is paying the money, it still denies doing anything wrong. However, the company is making some big changes to avoid future legal headaches. From now on, when someone sets up a new Android phone, Google will have to ask for consent to collect this data during the setup process. They are also adding a clear “off” switch in the settings so people can stop the data transfer whenever they want.
This has been a very expensive week for Google’s legal team. Just a few days ago, the company agreed to pay another $68 million in a separate case. In that one, users claimed the Google Assistant was “spying” on them after it mistakenly thought it heard “wake words” like “Hey Google.” Just like this latest case, Google denied those claims but chose to pay up to avoid a risky trial.
