Arizona AG announces $85 million Google settlement over location privacy lawsuit

FIRST ON FOX: Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich on Tuesday announced that his office had reached an $85 million settlement with Google over the state’s lawsuit targeting the Alphabet-owned tech giant’s efforts to track user's locations.

Brnovich’s office said the settlement marks the end of one of the biggest consumer fraud lawsuits in the state’s history.

"When I was elected attorney general, I promised Arizonans I would fight for them and hold everyone, including corporations like Google, accountable," Brnovich said in a statement. "I am proud of this historic settlement that proves no entity, not even big tech companies, is above the law." 

Brnovich's office sued Google in May 2020, alleging that the tech giant used deceptive and unfair practices to track users' location, even if they had opted out -- and used that information to target users with ads that generated more than $130 billion in revenue in 2019.

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The practice surfaced when the Associated Press report in 2018 that Google could continue to track users' locations even after they had opted out of Google getting access into "location history." The outlet reported that, even with location history paused, some Google apps automatically store time-stamped data without a prompt, such as storing a snapshot of a location just when someone opens its "Maps" application.

Google later tweaked its privacy settings and in a statement on Tuesday reiterated that the case was based on outdated policies.

"This case is based on outdated product policies that we changed years ago," José Castañeda, a Google spokesperson told Fox Business. "We provide straightforward controls and auto delete options for location data, and are always working to minimize the data we collect. We are pleased to have this matter resolved and will continue to focus our attention on providing useful products for our users."

Brnovich’s office had alleged in its lawsuit that Google acted deceptively, misleading consumers.

"We allege when consumers try to opt out of Google collecting location data, the company is continuing to find misleading ways to obtain that information and then use it for their financial advantage," Brnovich told FOX Business in an interview last year.

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Google had accused Arizona of misconstruing what Google does, and that the lawsuit has been encouraged by Oracle -- which has fought with Google in court over the rights to software code used in its Android software. Bloomberg News reported how Oracle has been lobbying regulators and law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and the E.U. to go after Google, including over privacy concerns.

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As part of the discovery process, emails between Google engineers sent in the wake of the 2018 AP article show that they had concerns about the practice, and believed the concerns raised in the article were valid. 

Google attempted this year to have the suit thrown out, arguing that the state had failed to show that the company's policies violated Arizona's consumer fraud law and pointing out that it has since clarified its privacy disclosures to customers.

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Judge Timothy Thomason acknowledged that the state's "contention that Google's alleged deception is in connection with the sale or advertising of merchandise is, at times, somewhat strained," and partially granted Google's request for summary judgment "as to the state's theory that the sale of ad placements to their parties is connected to a consumer sale." However, the judge denied Google's motion to toss the case in all other respects.

The settlement announced Tuesday would direct the bulk of the money to the state’s general fund, with $5 million directed for attorney general education programs.

Fox Business' Breck Dumas and The Associated Press contributed to this report.