GOOGLE TO REMOVE DATA FROM TRACKERS USING INCOGNITO MODE.

As part of a planned legal settlement, Google has consented to remove billions of records and to limit its ability to track users.

The agreement attempts to settle a class action lawsuit filed in the US in 2020, accusing the tech giant of violating users' privacy by gathering data even when they were using "private mode" on their browsers.

The lawsuit requested $5 billion in damages.

Despite contesting the allegations, Google is in favor of the agreement.

In response to the case, it has already made adjustments.

Outside of the US, data destruction will likewise be implemented.

The business revised its disclosures in January, soon after the two parties announced preparations to resolve the dispute, to clarify that it continued to track user data even when users choose to search anonymously or in "Incognito" mode.

Because it doesn't save browser history on the device, that mode offers a little more privacy.

During the same month, the company said that it had begun testing a feature that would prevent third-party cookies—which are used to track user behavior—for all Google Chrome users automatically.

According to the terms of the settlement agreement, which was announced on Monday in federal court in San Francisco, it had made that block automatic for Incognito users immediately after the case was filed in 2020 and has committed to guarantee the limit is in place for five years.

In a court filing on Monday, Google also consented to remove "hundreds of billions" of records of private browsing data that it had gathered.

Google spokeswoman Jorge Castaneda said in a statement, "We are pleased to settle this lawsuit, which we always believed was meritless," and the business would not be paying any damages.

"We are happy to delete old technical data that was never associated with an individual and was never used for any form of personalization."

Individuals continue to sue Google for privacy infractions; these lawsuits could result in fines.

Boies Schiller Flexner LLP attorney David Boies, who fought on behalf of users, referred to the agreement as a "historic step in requiring honesty and accountability from dominant technology companies."

The lawsuit had maintained that Google had followed users' activities even while they had their other browsers in "private mode" and the Google Chrome browser in "Incognito" mode, despite the company's claims to the contrary.

According to a court filing on Monday, Google employees referred to Incognito as "effectively a lie" and "a confusing mess" in documents that were discovered during the legal dispute.

Google attempted to have the lawsuit dismissed last year, but Judge Yvonne Rogers refused, stating that she did not believe customers permitted Google to track their online activities.

The court will now review and approve the settlement.

The deal was reached at a time when large digital companies' business practices are being examined more closely both domestically and internationally.

The US federal government has filed two distinct monopoly charges against Google and its parent firm Alphabet.

It recently resolved several other lawsuits as well.

It settled lawsuits from US states alleging that it tracked the whereabouts of users who had chosen not to use location services on their smartphones for close to $400 million (£318 million) in 2022.

In December 2023, it also consented to a payment of $700 million (£557 million) to end a lawsuit filed by several US states accusing it of suppressing competition for its Play Store on Android smartphones.