Google told to pay $22.5m for Safari privacy invasion

Google will pay $22.5m (€17.84m) to settle charges that it bypassed the privacy settings of customers using Apple’s Safari browser, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) said yesterday.

The deal ends a FTC probe into allegations that Google used computer codes known as “cookies” to trick the Safari browser on iPhones and iPads so the internet search firm could monitor users who had blocked such tracking.

The practice was in violation of a 2011 consent decree Google negotiated with the commission over its botched rollouts of the now defunct social network Buzz.