Google accepted to delete billions of data records relating to users' browsing activities to settle a class action lawsuit he claimed that the search giant was tracking them without their consent or knowledge in its Chrome browser.
How the Google lawsuit ended
The collective cause (class action), presented in 2020, claimed that the company had deceived users by tracking their Internet browsing activity, thinking it remained private when they used “incognito” or “private” mode on web browsers like Chrome.
At the end of December 2023 it is emerged that the well-known Mountain View company agreed to settle the lawsuit; the settlement is currently awaiting approval by U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.
“The settlement provides broad relief regardless of any challenges presented by Google's limited record keeping” reads a court filing dated April 1, 2024, which continues: “Much of the private browsing data in these logs will be completely deleted, including billions of event-level data records that reflect the private browsing activities of class members.“
As part of the data remediation process, Google is also required to delete information that makes private browsing data identifiable by redacting data points such as IP addressesthe generalization of User-Agent strings and removing verbose URLs within a specific website (i.e. keeping only the domain portion of the URL).
Furthermore, it was asked to eliminate the so-called camp X-Client-Data headerwhich Google described as a Chrome-Variations header that captures the “installation status of Chrome itself, including active variations, as well as server-side experiments that may affect the installation.”
This header is generated from a random seed value, making it potentially unique enough to identify specific Chrome users.
Other provisions of the agreement require Google to block third-party cookies within Chrome's Incognito mode for five years, a setting the company has already implemented for all users; the technology company also announced separate floors to eliminate tracking cookies by default by the end of the year.
Google later updated the wording for Incognito mode starting in January 2024 to clarify that the setting will not change.”how data is collected by the websites you visit and the services they use, including Google.”
The lawsuit drew admissions from Google employees who characterized the browser's incognito mode as a “confusing mess”, “effectively a lie” and a “problem of professional ethics and basic honesty”.
The well-known Mountain View company also highlighted internal exchanges in which executives argued that Incognito mode should not be called “private” because it risked “exaggerate known misconceptions“.
The development comes as Google he has declared that it has begun automatically blocking mass senders in Gmail who don't meet its email sender guidelines in an effort to reduce spam and phishing attacks.
The new requirements make it mandatory for email senders who send more than 5,000 messages per day to Gmail accounts provide an unsubscribe option with one click and respond to unsubscribe requests within two days.
Perception versus reality
It is a common perception that incognito or private mode within web browsers like Chrome does not guarantee complete anonymity; While this mode can be useful for hiding your browsing history and cookies from your local computer, it does not fully protect you from tracking by websites you visit or Internet service providers.
Users often underestimate this aspect and mistakenly believe that browsing in incognito mode makes their online activity completely anonymous, when in reality there are many other forms of tracking that can be used to identify and track users, such as IP address and browser fingerprinting.
The recent legal action against Google highlights this discrepancy between the perception and reality of online privacy.
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