Google settles US lawsuit over tracking in incognito mode

Google has decided to settle a class action lawsuit in the US. The company was accused by multiple complainants in June 2020 of tracking Chrome users in the browser’s incognito mode. It is not known what commitments Google has made.

According to a document of the court in the Northern District of California, the parties have agreed to each other’s terms. As a result, the trial, which was scheduled for February 5, is temporarily halted. It is not known exactly what Google and the complainants agreed to. The users demanded $5 billion in damages, but it is not clear whether Google has agreed to this. The agreement will be submitted to the court at the end of January. Final approval of the settlement will follow at the end of February.

The class action was filed in June 2020 by three users. Google would unlawfully violate the privacy of millions of users by allowing tracking in browsers’ private modes. This collection of data would be done via Google Analytics, Google Ad Manager and other apps and plug-ins.

Google has defended itself against those claims and wanted to end the lawsuit prematurely. In addition, the company says Chrome users will have the option to browse without the activity being saved to the browser on the device used. However, the federal judge disagreed and said that the company does not sufficiently inform users that data is being collected while the user is browsing in private mode.

“Google’s position is based on the idea that plaintiffs consent to Google collecting their data while they were browsing in private mode. Because Google never explicitly told users that this was happening, the Court cannot legally find that users consented to the collection of the data in question,” Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers said at the time Ars Technica.