Judge gives go-ahead for Google Assistant privacy lawsuit

A California federal judge on Thursday issued an order stating that Google faces a proposed class action lawsuit over privacy concerns over its digital assistant. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, accuses Google of recording certain users’ conversations and then analyzing the recordings to target advertising, despite the users having activated the Google Assistant by inadvertently.

The case arises from what are called false acceptances. If you say a “hot word” – for example, “Hey google“or” OK, Google “- near a device that has Google Assistant activated, the digital assistant will listen and respond to whatever you say next. But sometimes the hearing of Google Assistant is faulty. He may mistakenly think that you said any of these trigger phrases, and he will start listening to you even if you haven’t asked him to.

The seven plaintiffs in the lawsuit, each of whom owned devices such as Google Home, Samsung Galaxy Tab or Google Pixel, allege that once Google realizes that you didn’t intend to trigger Assistant, it is still using the content of your private conversations to personalize the announcements.

In a 37-page ruling Thursday, Judge Beth Freeman dismissed Google’s request to dismiss the lawsuit. The company had argued that its privacy policy allowed it to use the information it recorded even after a false acceptance. But the judge said device owners likely didn’t interpret the policy that way.

“Although Google’s privacy policy discloses that it will collect and use information for targeted advertising, it does not sufficiently inform users that it will use recordings made in the absence of manual activation or a hot word, ”Freeman wrote.

In a statement released Friday, Google did not directly address the lawsuit, but stressed that it does not keep the audio recordings of Google Assistant by default.

“Google Assistant is designed to keep your information safe, private and secure,” a Google spokesperson said. “By default, we don’t keep your audio recordings and make it easy to manage your privacy preferences, with things like simple answers to your privacy questions or enabling guest mode.”

When guest mode is enabled, Google “automatically removes audio recordings and Google Assistant activity from the device owner’s account,” according to a support page.

The judge allows the plaintiffs to pursue certain breach of contract claims, as well as allegations that Google violated certain California and federal privacy laws. The judge dismissed the plaintiffs’ California consumer protection claims, although they could be amended and resubmitted.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs did not respond to a request for comment.

See also: 6 new features of Google Assistant and how to use them