Google Can Be Sued By Every UK Safari User
A recent ruling of the UK Court of Appeal allowed the three existing plaintiffs to continue with their legal action against Google. The IT giant is being dragged into a lawsuit for allegedly violating the privacy rights of Safari users without asking for their consent. The incident disputed in the courtroom took place between 2011 and 2012 and this decision means that every Safari user who thinks that his or her privacy was violated by the Mountain View-based company during that period can join in and seek retribution for Google's wrongdoings. The only conditions that you need to meet in order to have a valid case against Google is to use the Safari web browser on Apple products during the relevant time frame.
The court's decision states: “These claims raise serious issues which merit a trial. They concern what is alleged to have been the secret and blanket tracking and collation of information, often of an extremely private nature, as specified in the confidential schedules, about and associated with the claimants’ internet use, and the subsequent use of that information for about nine months. [..] The case relates to the anxiety and distress this intrusion upon autonomy has caused.”
If you're wondering what the fuss is all about, it seems that Google circumvented some of Safari's security settings in order to covertly track their users browsing habits for advertising purposes. So far it's nothing new as almost everybody who uses the IT giant's services knows what to expect, but apparently, during that time frame, the company collected the data illegally without asking for the users' consent. Google has already paid almost $40 million in the US (a 22.5$ million fine from the FCC and a $17 million USD to settle a similar case), and it's very likely that the result of the UK trial will be almost the same.
