Google Hits a Wall in Australia: It’s Out of a Gutter
In late August, specifically on the 12th, the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) brought a verdict that pulled a rug from behind a pretty slick cup of coffee. Alphabet’s giant, Google, was ordered to cough up A$60 million (roughly US $58.4 million) for a major slip‑up in how it’s been collecting your GPS data.
The Bad News for Mobile Lovely
Back in 2017‑2018, when we were still about to drop Android phones into baby‑splitting pockets, Google told users that the “location history” toggle was the only way it could track their paces. Meanwhile, a sneaky feature that spun up behind the web and app activity secretly winked at the locations they were actually passing by. The court saw that as a big lie on the pattern of “only‑that‑setting‑collects‑your‑data.”
Which Users Got in the Line?
- Approximately 1.3 million Aussie Google account holders regarded their own Aussie Walk of Life as the only way the data could be recorded.
- Between January 2017 and December 2018, some 60‑plus million sides were misled—no, that’s for the penalty, not the number of users.
What Did Google Do?
When the SES (silly maybe, but just pretend it stands for “secret email service”) at the ACCC decided to bring Google to justice in October 2019, Google didn’t just sit idle. By the end of 2018, the company had already taken “remedial measures,” which really mean they turned the bad app settings into a user‑friendly menu.
Ugh, sorry! We often forget to mention learning from our mistakes.
The Bigger Picture: Aussie Rules? (Actually Australia Rules)
Alongside the location mis‑comm, the Australian government has been busy baking new laws that could make Google (and Meta’s Facebook) pay media companies for seed and sharable data. One more fuss, one more court order, one more dose of paperwork for the big tech companies.
The whole saga also upgraded the drama to include a new plotline where a politician demanded a whopping $708,000 from Google over a bellowed YouTube video? We cheated. That’s the drama we’re celebrating.
Google has declared the matter settled, assured users that “location information is now simpler to manage and easier to understand.” Do we believe them? We hope so when they improve the clarity of the user interface a bit more.
Takeaway
- Big tech gets penalized in the 60‑million-dollar range when they cheat about data.
- The Australian court will pay attention to how we use our phones.
- Expect more regulations, more fights, and hopefully fewer lies.
At the end of the day, everybody takes a lesson. Google — next year, please keep your promises and keep your jokes at the office, not in user settings. The world keeps rolling, whether you keep pace with the budget cuts!
