U.S. Jury Orders Google to Pay $425 Million for Continued Data Collection Post-Opt-Out

San Francisco – A federal jury in San Francisco has ordered Alphabet's Google to pay $425 million for violating user privacy. The verdict, delivered on Wednesday, September 3, 2025, concludes a class-action lawsuit alleging that Google continued to collect user data even after individuals had turned off their "Web & App Activity" tracking settings. The lawsuit, initially filed in July 2020, asserted that Google's practices misled users about their data control.

The class-action lawsuit covered approximately 98 million Google users and 174 million devices. Plaintiffs had initially sought over $31 billion in damages, but the jury found Google liable on two of three privacy claims and determined the company had not acted with malice, thus precluding punitive damages. The core of the complaint was that Google accessed and stored user data for eight years despite explicit privacy assurances.

Google has stated its intention to appeal the verdict. A Google spokesperson, Jose Castaneda, commented, > "This decision misunderstands how our products work. Our privacy tools give people control over their data, and when they turn off personalization, we honor that choice." During the trial, Google maintained that any data collected was "nonpersonal, pseudonymous, and stored in secured, encrypted locations," and not linked to individual user identities.

The lawsuit highlighted that Google allegedly continued to harvest user data through its relationships with third-party applications such as Uber, Venmo, and Instagram, which utilize Google analytics services. This ruling adds to a series of significant privacy challenges for the tech giant. David Boies, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, expressed satisfaction with the outcome, stating they were "obviously very pleased with the verdict the jury returned."

This verdict follows other substantial privacy-related legal actions against Google. Earlier in 2025, Google agreed to pay nearly $1.4 billion to settle claims with the state of Texas over alleged privacy law violations. Additionally, in April 2024, the company consented to destroy billions of data records from users' private browsing activities, including those in "Incognito" mode, to resolve a separate lawsuit concerning alleged tracking.