In early August 2022, the Australian federal Court ordered Google LLC to pay $60 million in penalties for making misleading representations to consumers about the collection and use of their personal location data on Android phones between January 2017 and December 2018.
This was after the internet giant was found guilty in breaching the Australian Consumer Law by representing to some Android users that the setting titled “Location History” was the only Google account setting that affected whether Google collected, kept and used personally identifiable data about their location.
In fact, another Google account setting titled “Web & App Activity” also enabled Google to collect, store and use personally identifiable location data when it was turned on, and that setting was turned on by default.
“This significant penalty imposed by the Court today sends a strong message to digital platforms and other businesses, large and small, that they must not mislead consumers about how their data is being collected and used,” the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said.
“Google, one of the world’s largest companies, was able to keep the location data collected through the “Web & App Activity” setting and that retained data could be used by Google to target ads to some consumers, even if those consumers had the “Location History” setting turned off.”
Google took remedial steps and had addressed all of the contravening conduct by 20 December 2018, meaning that users were no longer shown the misleading screens. The ACCC and Google jointly submitted to the Court that a penalty of $60 million against Google LLC was appropriate, and that no separate penalty against Google Australia Pty Ltd was necessary, in circumstances where the Australian company was not responsible for the preparation of the screens which the Court found were misleading.
