The investigation dates back to 2020.
Google has been fined heavily for violating European Union privacy rules regarding the processing of location data. The company will have to pay 403 million euros ($463 million) and make its processing of location data compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) within six months.
The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC), the company’s main regulator in the EU since Google’s European headquarters is in Dublin, began investigating the processing of location data in 2020 following complaints from consumer rights groups. The DPC examined how Google handled location data between May 2018 and February 2020 regarding three features: Web and App Activity (which records user activity across a host of Google services), Location History (an optional feature that shows a timeline of where users have been with their phone), and Location Accuracy (which shows where an Android device is located more accurately than GPS alone).
The DPC determined that Google did not fairly or lawfully treat location data in web and app activity and location history. According to the regulator, it has not demonstrated that it complies with the “principle of lawfulness, fairness and transparency” of the GDPR in terms of data processing in the location precision function.
The DPC claimed that the company had failed to comply with transparency rules for these three features. He added that Google violated GDPR location data retention rules in web and app activity and location history.
“This case centers on historical policies that have since been updated,” Google told the Associated Press in a statement. “Starting in 2019, we significantly evolved our practices and launched robust tools that simplify the management of location data. »
This is not the first time that Google has found itself in a difficult situation in the EU. This summer, the company lost its latest appeal over a $4.7 billion Android antitrust fine that the bloc imposed in 2018.
The European Commission also fined Google $1 billion in July after determining that it unfairly prioritized its own services in search results. The company agreed this month to make some changes to Search to reduce the fine. The DPC said there were “three other ongoing large-scale legal investigations into Google, all of which are at an advanced stage.”
The regulator said this was the fourth largest fine imposed since the GDPR came into force. The largest of these was a $1.3 billion fine against Meta for transferring the Facebook data of European citizens to servers in the United States.
