Google pays $68 million to settle allegations that its voice assistant spied on users

Google has agreed to pay $68 million to settle allegations that its voice assistant illegally spied on users to serve ads, among other things. Reuters reports.

Google did not admit to any wrongdoing in the class action settlement The company accused “The unlawful and intentional interception and recording of individuals’ confidential communications without their consent and the unauthorized disclosure of those communications to third parties.” The lawsuit also alleged that “information derived from these recordings was wrongfully transferred to third parties for targeted advertising and other purposes.”

The case centered around “He accepts a liar“, where Google Assistant allegedly activated and recorded a user’s communications even if they did not intentionally ask them to do so with a wake word. TechCrunch has reached out to Google for comment.

Americans have long suspected that their devices are inappropriately spying on them. Increasingly, these doubts have led to allegations of legal wrongdoing. In 2021 Apple He agreed to pay $95 million To settle allegations that its voice assistant, Siri, recorded their conversations without prompting from users.

Google, like other tech giants, has faced other privacy lawsuits in recent years. Last year, the company agreed to pay $1.4 billion to the state of Texas to settle two lawsuits claiming the company… You may have violated their own data privacy laws.