Brnovich began investigating Google after a 2018 Associated Press article said the company was misleading consumers about how they track and use their location data, according to a press release.
The Arizona Attorney General's Office, Mark Brnovich, announces that Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich has entered into an $85 million settlement with Google LLC for tracking users' sites allegedly with "deceptive and unfair" advertising practices.
In May 2020, Brnovich sued Google for allegedly tracking people's locations with deceptive practices and coercive design tactics built into its software — even if they were told to stop. The lawsuit accused the tech giant of taking users' location to inflate ad revenue, violating user privacy and not giving users a clear way to untrack the location.
Even when users turned off their location history in settings, Google allegedly collected their locations without their consent through other settings like web and app activity to sell ads, depending on the release. Google makes most of its revenue by selling ads that are shown to its users.
“The tactics that Google deploys to monitor the websites of its users — including users in Arizona — include intentionally deceptive and unfair acts and practices within the meaning of the Arizona Consumer Fraud Act,” the complaint states.
This was one of the largest consumer fraud lawsuits in Arizona history, according to the release, and the settlement is the largest per capita amount that Google has paid in a privacy and consumer fraud lawsuit like this.
Abdul as an "important legal ruling" in a Google blog post.
"We've always built privacy features into our products and introduced robust location data controls," Castañeda said after the lawsuit was filed.
Arizona is represented by the Phoenix-based law firm Gallagher & Kennedy.
Victor Benjamin, Assistant Professor of Information Systems at Arizona State University W.P. Carey School of Business, said Google's primary source of income comes from advertising. Benjamin offered that Google might be willing to compromise with the state to avoid incurring further costs through court decision and legal precedence not in its favour.
"Maybe they will free themselves of responsibilities or legal issues in the future by simply accepting the costs now to make those payments," Benjamin said.
He added that the amount won in the settlement was "just a bump in the road" for Google and other technology companies.