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Google wants browser data destroyed to settle consumer protection lawsuit

          Google wants browser data destroyed to settle consumer protection lawsuit




Google wants browser data destroyed to settle consumer protection lawsuit




Google has agreed to destroy billions of records to settle a lawsuit alleging that the company secretly tracked the internet usage of people who were supposedly browsing privately.


The terms of the settlement were filed Monday in federal court in Oakland, California, and must be approved by U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.


Lawyers for the plaintiffs estimated the deal at more than $5 billion, with a maximum of $7.8 billion. Google will not pay compensation, but users can individually sue the company for damages.


The class action lawsuit began in 2020 and affected millions of Google users who had private browsing since June 1, 2016.


Users allow Google's analytics, cookies, and apps to open Alphabet (GOOGL.O), open new tab units, set Google's Chrome browser to "incognito" mode, and set other browsers to "private" browsing mode. said that users who have it set to ``cannot be properly tracked''.


This will make Google an "inexplicable treasure trove of information," providing information about your friends, favorite foods, hobbies, shopping habits, and the "most intimate and potentially embarrassing things" you search for online. They said it became.



As part of the settlement, Google will update its disclosures about what it collects during "private" browsing, a process Google has already begun. Additionally, a secret user can block third-party cookies for her 5 years.



"As a result, Google collects less data from users' private browsing sessions, and Google receives less revenue from that data," the plaintiffs' attorneys wrote.



Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said the company was pleased to settle the lawsuit, which it had previously considered without merit.

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