California and New York residents have filed two separate lawsuits this week against Google alleging that changes to the company’s privacy policy violate users’ privacy rights. The suits seek class-action status.
The change in Google’s guidelines enacted March 1 “violates Google’s prior privacy policies, which deceived and misled consumers by stating that Google would not utilize information provided by a consumer in connection with his or her use of one service, with any other service, for any reason, without the consumer’s consent.”
“It also violates consumers’ privacy rights, allowing Google to take information from a consumer’s Gmail account and Google+ account, which may have one expectation of privacy, and use it in a different context,…” the suit says. This is in violation of a consent decree Google reached with the Federal Trade Commission last year, claims the suit, filed on Tuesday by three New York residents.
Source: CNET.com
