Thu Sep 04 06:25:16 UTC 2025: **Headline: Google Ordered to Pay $425 Million in Privacy Lawsuit, Vows Appeal**
**San Francisco, CA** – A U.S. jury has ruled against Google, ordering the tech giant to pay $425 million for violating the privacy of millions of users who believed they had opted out of app tracking. The verdict, delivered on Wednesday in San Francisco, stems from a lawsuit filed in July 2020 alleging that Google continued to collect and sell data on users’ mobile app activity even after they disabled personalization settings.
The lawsuit, representing approximately 98 million Google users, claimed the company breached its own privacy assurances regarding its Web & App Activity settings. Plaintiffs argued that Google profited from their data despite their attempts to prevent tracking.
Google vehemently denies the allegations and has announced its intention to appeal the decision. “Our privacy tools give people control over their data, and when they turn off personalization, we honor that choice,” said Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda in a statement. The company argued during the trial that the collected data was “nonpersonal” and stored securely.
This verdict adds to Google’s growing list of privacy-related legal battles. In May, the company agreed to pay $1.375 billion to the state of Texas to settle claims that it collected residents’ biometric data without consent and tracked locations even when users opted out. This latest ruling underscores the increasing scrutiny of data privacy practices within the tech industry and could have significant implications for how companies handle user data in the future.
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