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Print 11 comment(s) - last by Tony Swash.. on Aug 11 at 5:59 AM

  (Source: mostlyblog.com)
This is the largest ever given by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission

It has been confirmed that Google will pay $22.5 million to settle its case with Apple regarding bypassing Safari's security settings.

This move was predicted last month, when reports started circulating that Google's possible $22.5 million fine in the case would be the largest ever given by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

Google was charged with bypassing Apple Safari user privacy settings in order to track people who had previously blocked that type of tracking. Google used special computer cookies to accomplish this. These third-party cookies are used to track what users are doing on the Internet, which in turn helps Web giants like Google target users with suitable advertisements.
 
However, the Wall Street Journal ended up outing Google for placing the ad-tracking cookies on Safari users.

Google was able to successfully get past Safari's browser settings for privacy, which attempts to block certain types of cookies. Safari accepts first-party cookies (the Web site the user is on) or second-party cookies (the user's browser), but blocks third-party cookies, which links the browser to an entirely different Web site. The mobile version of Safari, which can be found on iOS devices, has the ability to block all cookies or none at all.

Google responded to the charges by saying that the tracking was unintentional, and that no harm came from the company's inadvertent actions.

"The FTC is focused on a 2009 help center page," said Google. "We have now changed that page and taken steps to remove the ad cookies."

But that's not stopping the FTC from slamming Google with the huge fine. Google wasn't required to admit any wrongdoing in the case to receive the charges/fine.

"No matter how big or small, all companies must abide by FTC orders against them and keep their privacy promises to consumers," said Jon Leibowitz, FTC chairman.

Google was ordered to disable the tracking cookies that were placed on Safari users.

Source: Reuters


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This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled
By sprockkets on 8/10/2012 11:52:01 AM , Rating: 3
AGAIN

https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=35824

Bug/Feature request regarding problem with Safari being too restrictive on 3rd party cookies

And this for the IE "debacle"

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/a-loophol...

http://support.google.com/accounts/bin/answer.py?h...




By ritualm on 8/10/2012 12:49:36 PM , Rating: 2
wtb Jason Mick editing this article plox


By TakinYourPoints on 8/10/2012 5:50:09 PM , Rating: 2
Why? Are we trying to multiply poor fact checking, editing, and toss in biased editorializing at the same time?


By GotThumbs on 8/10/2012 1:57:43 PM , Rating: 2
Again,

Who cares.

Any one today should know that these cookies are used for marketing purposes. Anyone using FB is tracked specifically for this reason....in fact anyone on the web is tracked for this reason.

Companies want to focus their marketing on consumers who are most likely to use or need their product. It saves them from mass marketing to people who would never be interested.

FTC is just filling their pockets. 22.5 million is based on what damages? Please show me actual damages..other than to Apples pride for having such lame coding....that this imposed on any of the users.

FTC...please provide a legitimate justification for this amount. Does Barry get a portion of this or what?




By geddarkstorm on 8/10/2012 5:56:44 PM , Rating: 3
Meanwhile, Facebook lured thousands of people to its product with false promises of privacy, made billions in marketing by selling users private data after violating those promises, and the FTC isn't fining them a cent--instead simply telling Facebook to honor what it already promised everyone.

It's a strange world we live in, sometimes. http://gizmodo.com/5933656/ftc-lets-facebook-off-t...


By Tony Swash on 8/11/2012 5:59:46 AM , Rating: 1
quote:
Who cares.


Surely the point is that apparently millions of people did care enough to actually change their default setting and block attempt to track them.

You may think that pointless, you make think they shouldn't bother, but surely it's their choice.

And when users made that explicit choice to block tracking cookies what did Goggle do? Well they quite deliberately and secretly implemented a hack to bypass the privacy settings of many millions of people. Because it helped them make money.

There is no ambiguity here. Users said they didn't want information about them collected by anyone, and Google said we don't care what you want we are going to collect it anyway and not tell anyone we are collecting it.

If you don't find that appallingly unethical behaviour by a large company then clearly your ethical standards are not very high.

In fact we know why people leap to the defence of Google in this matter. It's because this involved Apple and Google. Apparently some morons actually think that any attack on Apple, on any of it's products or on any of it's customers is OK, and that conversely anything and everything Google does is great.

What sad saps.


How is this in any way correct?
By Shadowself on 8/10/2012 12:57:03 PM , Rating: 4
quote:
It has been confirmed that Google will pay $22.5 million to settle its case with Apple regarding bypassing Safari's security settings.


This is not a Google case "with" Apple. This is not a case between Google and Apple. Google is not suing Apple. Apple is not suing Google. Google is not paying Apple anything (let alone $22.5 milion) or expected to pay Apple anything. Apple is not paying anything to Google. This is not a case of Google *and* Apple (Google "with" Apple) against anyone else. This is not a case of anyone else against Google *and* Apple.

This had virtually nothing to do with Apple other than Google found an easy way around Apple's privacy implementation (a pretty stupidly simple implementation on Apple's part for not *really* sandboxing where cookies went). Google implemented that tracking contrary to user's desires. Google got outed. The FTC smacked them. Apple was just a dumb bystander. The user got targeted with Google ads when they didn't want to be. Apple never got hurt at all and Apple did not benefit from this final outcome.




RE: How is this in any way correct?
By Belard on 8/10/2012 1:44:17 PM , Rating: 1
Apple smiled....


When "all" isn't everyone.
By drycrust3 on 8/10/2012 12:25:38 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
"No matter how big or small, all companies must abide by FTC orders against them and keep their privacy promises to consumers," said Jon Leibowitz, FTC chairman.
Google was ordered to disable the tracking cookies that were placed on Safari users.

Are Google going to disable just cookies within America's national borders, or are they going to disable them everywhere?




By sprockkets on 8/10/2012 12:28:02 PM , Rating: 2
They already removed it months ago. There isn't a US vs. world version.


Fixed
By bupkus on 8/10/12, Rating: 0
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