Popular online search engine Google has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by Wisconsin and several other states.
Wisconsin was one of 37 states and the District of Columbia that sued the company over allegations that it misled uses of Apple’s Safari Web browser about privacy settings between June of 2011 and February of 2012. The suit claimed Google told users their web browsing would be kept private by using the “DoubleClick” plug-in, but it still allowed advertisers to track them by altering a code to get around Safari’s default settings. Google stopped the practice in early 2012 after the issue gained widespread attention.
Wisconsin will receive $336,000 as part of an overall $17 million settlement with Google. Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen says the case shows that people are entitled to have accurate information about the privacy of their web surfing.
