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Google pays $8.5 million in a privacy settlement
GOOGLE HAS SETTLED a lawsuit over privacy violations in its Buzz service.
The rolling debacle over Google's misfiring on all cylinders Buzz continues. We reported back in April that the company was taking the heat for steam-rolling privacy rights every time it released a new application. Now it has bitten the bullet on Buzz privacy violations and settled a US lawsuit for $8.5 million.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Google agreed to pay the fine in a private class action lawsuit with most of the cash being used to fund privacy policy awareness efforts. The rest is going to pay the plaintiffs lawyers and the costs of the lawsuit.
Seven Buzz users decided to sue the company when their Gmail contact lists were visible to other Buzz users. This feature could be disabled in Buzz settings but it was loaded as the default option.
Like Facebook, Google came under fire for lacking online security in its applications. Both companies have some odd ideas about privacy and don't seem to understand why anyone would want it.
Despite its settlement, Google claims that it didn't violate any laws. However, as part of the settlement the company agreed to clearly outline its privacy policies for users. It did this with a blog posting on Friday 3 September. µ
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In USA ,When you open a new bank account at a new bank , the bank sells or shares your address and phone info to advertisers and other companies unless you OPT-OUT. (which they don't tell you and it's hidden in some very small print in pages of other new account papers you get by mail later , AFTER they already shared it.) But the default is to op-in everyone .
I found this out the hard way by finally asking one of the many phone solicitors/saleman where he got my unlisted number from. And he said he wasn't supposed to tell me but he did. HE GOT IT FROM MY BANK!
Many other companies do this to you also , like phone companies , power companies , mortgage companies.
Why not go after them for the default sharing of your private info ? Oh wait maybe they have better lobbists that bought off your Gov. officials to allow them to act that same way.