Google is fined millions for collecting location data by disabling GPS

Google Agreed to pay $85 million (~R$441 million) to settle a lawsuit alleged by the company Collect user location dataEven when GPS is off.

The lawsuit was filed in the United States state of Arizona in 2020, with the attorney general claiming that Google uses “obscure patterns” to obtain a user’s location to serve ads.

Authorities allege in the lawsuit that Google used weather applications to collect a user’s location. This happened even when the GPS was turned off in the smartphone settings.

A second charge against Google is that the company overcomplicates privacy settings to make location features difficult to access. As a result, as long as you disable the smartphone’s GPS, the user is often unaware that Google continues to collect data.

Commenting on the settlement, Google spokesman Jose Castaneda noted that the lawsuit was brought on the basis of outdated privacy policies.

We provide simple controls and automatic deletion options for location data and always work to minimize the data we collect.

This is not the first time Google has been fined for collecting location data. The company already Processed in Australia, France and UK.