With the recent changes in privacy policies that Google has ushered across its line of products and not offering any opt-out, users have raised concern over the lack of privacy and choices. Now, the FTC is being sued for not stopping Google from implementing these changes.
As PCWord reports, the Electronic Privacy Information Center has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, asking the court to stop Google from making these planned privacy changes. According to the filing, the privacy changes “will make it possible for advertisers to gain access to personal information which was previously unavailable to them. Google ads are targeted to individual users based on information Google gathers about individual users.”
EPIC believes that Google has “placed the privacy interests of literally hundreds of millions of Internet users at grave risk.” EPIC firmly believes that the FTC should enforce the consent order but failed to do it.
The FTC responded to these claims by stating, “The FTC takes compliance with our consent orders very seriously and always looks carefully at any evidence that they are being violated.”
Google also responded to these claims by stating, “Google takes privacy very seriously. We’re happy to engage in constructive conversations about our updated privacy policy but EPIC is wrong on the facts and the law.”
Google plans on implementing a new privacy policy on the 1st of March that consolidates user data from over 60 of its services. EPIC believes that this is a “clear violation” of that privacy agreement.