Supervisor Elham AbolFateh
Editor in Chief Mohamed Wadie

Google Faces $5 Billion Lawsuit after Tracking Users' Private Data


Mon 15 Mar 2021 | 03:27 AM
Taarek Refaat

Google has been hit with a $5 billion fine after failing to win a dismissal of a lawsuit alleging that it collects user data about internet activity even when they browse in the browser's incognito mode.

A federal judge on Friday rejected the tech giant's request to dismiss the lawsuit, which is seeking to place the class-action lawsuit.

"The court concluded that Google did not notify users that Google was involved in the alleged data collection while the user was in private browsing mode," US District Court judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California wrote in her ruling.

The ruling comes amid an ongoing scrutiny of tech giants like Google and Facebook over how much data companies have collected from consumers.

The lawsuit was filed in June against Google for violating wiretapping and privacy laws by continuing to "intercept, track and collect communications" even when people use Chrome's incognito mode and other private web browser browsers.

The U.S. giant said last year that it would block third-party cookies that track inpiduals' browsing across websites and target ads for them based on their activity.

The lawsuit, which seeks at least $5 billion from Google's parent company Alphabet, alleges that the company is surreptitiously collecting data through Google Analytics, Google Ad Manager and plug-ins for other websites and apps.

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but said earlier that it objects to the allegations, adding that every time users open a new incognito tab, they are informed that websites may be able to collect information about their browsing activity.