In response to a lengthy legal battle with Australia’s competition authority over misleading users about collecting their personal location data, Google has agreed to pay $60 million in fines.
Background
The federal court determined in April of last year that Google had violated consumer protection regulations by misleading some local users to believe the corporation was not using Android operating systems to acquire personal data about their locations. With a user’s location history set to “off” but their browser and app activity set to “on”, the issue in the case was whether it was sufficiently apparent that Google would still collect and access location data if one of Google’s apps being used.
The company was also discovered to have broken two more consumer laws, one related to conducting that could mislead the general public and the other involving misleading representations about the performance characteristics of a service.
The case law
When the decision was made, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said it sent a clear message to digital platforms telling them to be transparent with users about what is happening with their data. When the decision was made, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said it sent a clear message to digital platforms telling them to be transparent with users about what is happening with their data.
A brief federal court hearing on Friday heard that the parties had agreed that a $60 million penalty was “fair and reasonable” and that a joint proposal had been made to Justice Thomas Thawley. However, the court heard that there may still be questions regarding whether the penalty rendered the future “economically irrational” and if the penalty was appropriate.
Thawley congratulated the parties and stated that he was confident the fine was within a reasonable range.
