Feed: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
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Title: Google ordered to pay $425 million in app data collection lawsuit

Date: Thu, 04 Sep 2025 12:00:48 +0000
Link: https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/google-orde...

Google must pay $425 million to the plaintiffs of a class action lawsuit that
accused the company of collecting users' data even after they've turned off a
tracking feature, a federal jury has decided. The lead plaintiff sued Google
back in July 2020, arguing that the company still harvested data even though
it tells users they can disable tracking under Web & App Activity through its
connection with other apps, such as Uber and Instagram. US District Judge
Richard Seeborg then certified the lawsuit as class action, involving 98
million Google users and 174 million devices.

The plaintiffs' lawyers asked for $31 billion in damages, but the jury only
found Google liable on two of the three privacy violation claims. Google
didn't violate the California Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud
Act and didn't act out of malice, the jury found. As a result, the jury
concluded that the plaintiffs aren't entitled to any punitive damages.

In a statement, Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda said that the decision
"misunderstands how [their] products work." He added that the company's
privacy tools give users control over their data and insisted that Google
honors people's choice to turn off personalization. Castaneda said that
Google plans to appeal.

The company faced several similar privacy lawsuits in the past. Another 2020
lawsuit accused Google of tracking users in Incognito mode, and the company
agreed to settle the $5 billion lawsuit in 2023. A year later, it admitted
that it can indeed collect information in Incognito and promised to destroy
billions of data collected from Incognito tracking to settle the complaint.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-
tech/google-ordered-to-pay-425-million-in-app-data-collection-lawsuit-
120048799.html?src=rss

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