Under the proposed terms of a class action lawsuit settlement, Google will delete hundreds of billions of records that collected user data while they were browsing in Incognito, or private, mode. The data deletion will apply both in America and outside of the U.S.
Although Google disputes the case’s claims, it has already made changes in response. In January, the tech giant revised it disclosures to clarify that the company still tracked user data while searching privately, as well as trialed a feature that automatically blocks third-party cookies, used for tracking activity, in Google Chrome.
“We are pleased to settle this lawsuit, which we always believed was meritless,” said Google spokesman Jorge Castaneda said in a statement. “We are happy to delete old technical data that was never associated with an individual and was never used for any form of personalization.”
The company will not be paying any of the $5 billion sought in damages. However, Google still faces lawsuits over privacy violations from individual users, and those could end with financial penalties.
