After winning a massive $425 million verdict against Google last month, a group of U.S. consumers is now asking a federal judge to force the tech giant to cough up an additional $2.36 billion in profits.
The request comes after a jury found that Google had secretly collected app activity data from millions of users, even after they had turned off a feature that was supposed to stop that tracking. The plaintiffs are calling the $2.36 billion a “conservative approximation” of the money Google illegally made from their data.
“The jury found that Google’s conduct was highly offensive, harmful, and without consent,” the consumers’ lawyers wrote in a new court filing. They argue that the initial $425 million verdict is “clearly insufficient” to compensate for the harm Google caused, especially since the company has not changed its data-collection practices since the verdict.
Google, of course, is fighting back. The company has denied any wrongdoing and plans to appeal the jury’s decision. It’s also asking the judge to throw out the verdict and even to “decertify” the class of 98 million users, effectively killing the lawsuit.
The original lawsuit, filed in 2020, accused Google of accessing users’ mobile devices over the course of eight years to collect and use their data, in violation of its privacy promises. Now, a judge will have to decide whether Google must pay even more for its actions.
