Google Under Fire For Tracking Safari Users

Author:

Wendy Davis

Source:

Google could well face Federal Trade Commission sanctions for dropping tracking cookies on Safari users after explicitly telling them that Safari blocked cookies, legal experts predict. "I have trouble seeing how the FTC could ignore this," says Justin Brookman, director of consumer privacy for the digital rights group Center for Democracy & Technology. New York Law School professor James Grimmelmann adds that Google's move is "an open-and-shut" violation of the consent decree it signed with the FTC over the launch of the defunct social network Google Buzz. That agreement calls for Google to accurately represent its privacy practices. Google explicitly told users that the Safari browser would automatically block cookies. The company has since deleted that language from its site, but Consumer Watchdog saved a screenshot. Google confirmed on Friday that it developed ...