Lawsuit claims tech giant bypassed iPhone default privacy settings between June 2011- Feb 2012
Google is facing legal action on behalf of 5.4m people in England and Wales over allegations that it unlawfully collected personal data from iPhone users by bypassing privacy settings.
Google reportedly used cookies, small pieces of computer text that are used to collect information from devices, to deliver targeted ads. The tech giant is accused of breaching principles in the UK’s data protection laws in a “violation of trust” against iPhone users.
Ex-Which director, Richard Lloyd is taking a so-called ‘representative action’ against the tech giant and aims to land at least £1bn in compensation. His campaign, Google You Owe Us, believes that between June 2011 and February 2012, Google bypassed the default privacy settings on users’ iPhones to collect user data unlawfully.
Lloyd told Sky News: “My job is to represent everyone that was affected by this breach of trust by Google to make sure that these vast companies have to be held accountable in the British courts.”
Lloyd also estimates the users could get as much as “several hundred pounds each” in compensation.
“They’re not above the law. And we want to see more than five million British consumers given the compensation they’re due,” Lloyd added.
A Google spokesperson told Sky News: “This is not new – we have defended similar cases before. We don’t believe it has any merit and we will contest it.”
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