A British consumer group is accusing Google of illegally collecting data on iPhone users by working around their devices’ privacy protections in 2011 and 2012.
The group, Google You Owe Us, filed a lawsuit against the tech giant on Thursday, saying it’s the first time a major company has faced a class action suit over the abuse of data.
“I believe that what Google did was quite simply against the law,” said Richard Lloyd, who’s representing the group. “Their actions have affected millions, and we’ll be asking the courts to remedy this major breach of trust.”
{mosads}The group alleges that Google’s algorithms were able to bypass default iPhone privacy settings through the Safari web browser and collect individuals’ data to target them with advertisements.
In the U.S., Google agreed to a $22.5 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission in 2012 after the company was accused of falsely promising not to use tracking “cookies” on Safari users.
Google did not respond when asked to comment on the lawsuit, but the internet search giant told Bloomberg that the issue is not new.
“We don’t believe it has any merit and we will contest it,” a company spokesperson told the outlet.
Google You Owe Us says about 5.4 million residents of the United Kingdom were affected by the “Safari workaround.”