Google to pay 'largest ever' $22.5mln fine for bypassing users' privacy settings

Washington, Aug 10 (ANI): Internet search giant Google has agreed to pay a 22.5 million dollars fine to settle charges with US regulators that it bypassed the privacy settings of customers using Apple's Safari browser.

The firm agreed to pay the heavy fine imposed by the US Federal Trade Commission, after it emerged that the firm monitored web surfers using Apple's Safari browser who had a 'do not track' privacy setting selected.

This is the largest fine ever imposed on a single company by the FTC, the BBC reports.

The government agency launched its inquiry after a Stanford University researcher noticed the issue while studying targeted advertising.

He revealed that Google was exploiting a loophole that let its cookies be installed via adverts on popular websites, even if users' browsers' preferences had been set to reject them.

This allowed the firm to track people's web-use habits even if they had not given it permission to do so.

According to the report, Google said no 'personal information', such as names or credit card data, had been collected, and that the action had been inadvertent. (ANI)