Court Rules Class-Action Claimants May File Individual Arbitration in Google Privacy Case
The U.S. District Court for Northern California denied Google’s motion to reject a request by almost 70,000 claimants in a class action suit about recording Google Assistant conversations without consent Friday. This allows the claimants to leave the class suit and file individual arbitrations against Google.
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“The Court has little hesitation in denying Google’s motion,” said Judge Beth Labson Freeman. “Although the Court acknowledges that the Arbitration Claimants’ opt-out requests did not adhere to the procedure laid out in the Long-Form Notice, the Court concludes that their exclusion requests were nonetheless effective. The Arbitration Claimants shall be excluded from the Class.”
The class action was filed in July 2019 on allegations that Google violated the California Invasion of Privacy Act by intentionally recording confidential conversations between consumers and Google Assistant without consumer consent. In Google's motion to reject the mass exclusion request on Jan. 23, the company argued that opt-out can't be done on a mass scale and the request did not adhere to court-approved requirements.