Google also did not properly obtain users’ consent for the purpose of showing them personalized ads, the watchdog agency said. To French regulators, Google’s business practices ran afoul of Europe’s new General Data Protection Regulation. Full details about what Google does with users’ personal information are “excessively disseminated across several documents,” according to the CNIL. Even though Google users can modify their privacy settings when they create an account, French regulators said it still isn’t enough — partly because the default setting is for Google to display personalized ads to users. Other companies, she said, had engaged in practices similar to Google, raising the possibility that additional U.S. tech giants could face fines of their own.

Source: Washington Post January 21, 2019 15:29 UTC