German consumer organization sues Google for ‘illegal cookie banners’

A German consumer organization has filed a complaint in a Berlin court against Google. The organization claims that the American search giant is purposely complicating cookie banners so that users would accept them and share their data.

According to Verbraucherzentrale NRW Google is deliberately making it more difficult for consumers on its cookie banners to refuse the acceptance of cookies instead of accepting them. “Visitors only have to click once to agree to the cookies, while they will be redirected to a new menu if they want to block cookies,” it sounds. There they also have to go through at least three different categories of cookies before the settings can be saved by Google and the consumer can return to the home page.

The NRW claims that Google uses so-called dark patterns. That term refers to online user interfaces designed to mislead people. In addition, according to the organization, the design of the cookie banners violates EU data protection law. “It should be as easy as possible for consumers to refuse cookies as it is to accept them,” said CEO Wolfgang Schuldzinski. “This is the only way to prevent careless disclosure of data.”

According to a German court, Google has announced that it is working on a redesigned banner that will make it possible to refuse cookies with one click. According to the German weekly Der Spiegel Google’s new cookie banner will be rolled out for the first time in France, where Google has been in the crosshairs of the French privacy regulator CNIL since late last year for allegedly making cookie consents more difficult. Then other European countries will follow. An exact date has not been communicated.

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