Google could be fined $22.5 million for bypassing Safari privacy settings

Google has been in hot soup before due to issues of privacy, but its latest run in with the law seems to be pretty severe. A number of months ago, the search engine juggernaut was reportedly circumventing users’ privacy settings in Apple’s Safari web browsers by illegally sneaking cookies onto users’ computers. While these cookies gave users Google’s +1 button to recommend sites, it also allowed cookies from Google’s ad network DoubleClick to sneak in as well.

The fine for Google’s unlawful practices hasn’t been set in stone just yet, but according to the Wall Street Journal it’s likely to be around $22.5 million. Though that might seem like an awful lot of cash for us regular folk – Google reportedly made that amount of cash every five hours or so last year. However, it is also expected to be the largest penalty ever levied on a single company by the US FTC. Read up more about the case at the source link below.

George Wong
Categories: Web
Tags: ftc, Google, Legal