Google was sued by DC for misleading Android data collection

The Washington DC Attorney General is suing Google over misleading location permission policies. The claim, prompted by a 2018 Associated Press article, claims that Google was financially motivated to promote its advertising business and collect location data from Android users to access your data through confusing settings and language.

Methods of hiding location data are actively blocked. “Since at least 2014, Google has been deceiving consumers about how the company tracks and uses their location and the ability of users to protect their privacy by preventing this tracking.

Google prompts users to trust whether or not Google collects information about their location and how that information is used. In fact, consumers who use Google products can trust Google to collect, store and profit from its location, ”the lawsuit alleges.

Google has recently begun offering users ways to reduce the amount of data they upload to their servers and automatically delete data if the user chooses. Offers, the district says inadequate and instead optimized only for confusion. This means that users will continue to upload data in some form.

“District research has revealed that Google may also provide other settings to give users control over the location data that Google collects and uses. But Google’s understanding of these settings is misleading, vague, and incomplete. Regardless of the settings, Google products have no choice but to allow customers to store, store and use their location. ”

In a statement shared with The Verge, Google Policy spokesman Jose Castaneda said, “The Attorney General is filing a case based on false claims and old claims about our settings. We always use the privacy features in our products.” And provided stronger controls for location data.”