Google will pay Connecticut $520,823 as part of a $7 million settlement with 37 states over the unauthorized collection of unsecured wi-fi data by its roving “Street View” vehicles that collect images for its mapping system, Attorney General George Jepsen announced Tuesday.
As the lead state in the investigation, Connecticut won a larger share of the settlement that was negotiated by Jepsen as a part of a consortium of eight states. Google also promised to retrain its workers.
“While the $7 million is significant, the importance of this agreement goes beyond financial terms,” Jepsen said. “Consumers have a reasonable expectation of privacy. This agreement recognizes those rights and ensures that Google will not use similar tactics in the future to collect personal information without permission from unsuspecting consumers.”
Google has called the data collection inadvertent.