Google has agreed to pay record fine $22,5 million to settle allegations that it violated its privacy promises by bypassing the privacy settings of users of Apple’s Safari Internet browser in order to track them.
Google is going to pay $22.5 million, a record penalty from the Federal Trade Commission for violating previous promises, but a pittance for the multibillion-dollar search behemoth, for fibbing to users of Apple’s Safari browser about its online-tracking practices.
Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz said in a statement : ‘ The record-setting penalty in this matter sends a clear message to all companies under an FTC privacy order. No matter how big or small, all companies must abide by FTC orders against them and keep their privacy promises to consumers, or they will end up paying many times what it would have cost to comply in the first place. ‘
The Google’s record penalty, which has reportedly been in the works for weeks, is the biggest fine the FTC has ever levied on a corporation for violating the terms of a previous settlement.
While the record fine is a drop in the bucket for a company that had around $45 billion cash in the bank at the end of 2011, FTC officials said Google could be subject to greater fines if the company commits additional violations.
Google hit with record $22,5 million penalty for Safari tracking / Google Privacy Violations
To settle a previous case, Google had signed a twenty-year agreement that, among other things, included a company pledge not to mislead consumers about its privacy practices.
The Federal Trade Commission opened its investigation into the Apple’s Safari activities 6 months ago after a researcher at Stanford University revealed that Google had overridden Safari safeguards that are supposed to prevent outside parties from monitoring web surfing activity without a user’s permission.
The Google tracking occurs through snippets of computer coding, known as cookies, that help internet services and advertisers target marketing pitches based on an analysis of the interests implied by a person’s web surfing activity.
Google company immediately withdrew its intrusive technology from Apple’s Safari after the manipulation was officially reported.
But the circumvention of Apple’s Safari built-in settings appeared to contradict a statement in Google’s online help centre assuring Safari users that they did not need to do anything more to ensure their online activities would not be logged by Google.
Google pays record $22,5 million fine for broken a privacy promise
Google has agreed last year to undergo an independent audit every 2 years for two decades as part of a settlement over allegations that it violated its privacy policies by automatically signing up Gmail users for Google Buzz.
The FTC alleged in its latest complaint that despite its promises to the contrary, Google between 2011 and 2012 placed electronic cookies on the devices of Apple’s Safari browser users to track those users for advertising purposes. In many cases, Google bypassed the default setting on Safari’s browser that blocked such cookies.
Google has apparently removed the cookies from most of the affected consumer devices and will have until 2014 to finish the job.
The FTC says it will continue to monitor Google to ensure that it does not engage in deceptive practices. Google has 19 years left on the 20-year settlement it reached last year that prevents the search giant from misrepresenting how it handles user information and requires Google to submit to regular privacy audits.
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