Watch out Google, Spain has just hit the company with a $1.2 million fine for breaking the country’s privacy protection laws.
There has been a lot of news in the media lately about the NSA tracking everything we search, tweet and share on the internet. Sources have also claimed that you can be spied on through your web cam without your led light turning on.
This infringement of privacy rights has landed Google in hot water with the Data Protection Agency in Spain finding the company guilty of collecting information about users and sharing the data across services. Each violation resulted in a fine of around $400,000 and Google will have to pay up $1.2 million.
The agency said, “Google doesn’t give users enough information about which data it collects, for what purposes it uses the data, it combines the data obtained through different services, and it keeps it for an undefined amount of time.”
Google will now be forced to comply with Spanish law and five more European countries- France, Germany, Italy, the UK and the Netherlands are all investigating Google as well. The fines from each country could exceed $1 million.
In the US, Google reached a $17 million settlement with 37 US state over its breach or privacy laws.
“Consumers should be able to know whether there are other eyes surfing the web with them,” said New York Attorney General, Eric Scheiderman. “By tracking millions of people without their knowledge, Google violated not only their privacy, but also their trust.”