SYDNEY: Google is under investigation in Australia following claims that it collects data from millions of Android smartphone users, who unwittingly pay their telecom service providers for gigabytes consumed by the activity, regulators said on Tuesday.
A spokesman for Google said the company has users' permission to collect data. "Charges for transmission of data over a cellular connection, including any location-related data, would be governed by a user's mobile carrier plan," Google said. "The types and quantity of such data that a user's device transmits would depend on the products or services they use... in some cases a user's settings," it added.
TOP COMMENT
All these companies, Google, facebook, whatsapp, instagram and many others are parasites who feed on their users.
Maharaj Gupta
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the country's privacy commissioner said they were reviewing the findings of a report by Oracle Corp. "We are exploring how much consumers know about the use of location data and are working closely with the privacy commissioner," said Geesche Jacobsen, a spokeswoman for the competition regulator. Oracle, according to The Australian newspaper, said Alphabet gets detailed information about people's internet searches and user locations if they have an Android phone.
Transferring that information to Google means using up gigabytes of data that consumers have paid for under data packages purchased from local telecom service providers, according to the Oracle report.SYDNEY: Google is under investigation in Australia following claims that it collects data from millions of Android smartphone users, who unwittingly pay their telecom service providers for gigabytes consumed by the activity, regulators said on Tuesday.
A spokesman for Google said the company has users' permission to collect data. "Charges for transmission of data over a cellular connection, including any location-related data, would be governed by a user's mobile carrier plan," Google said. "The types and quantity of such data that a user's device transmits would depend on the products or services they use... in some cases a user's settings," it added.
TOP COMMENT
All these companies, Google, facebook, whatsapp, instagram and many others are parasites who feed on their users.
Maharaj Gupta
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the country's privacy commissioner said they were reviewing the findings of a report by Oracle Corp. "We are exploring how much consumers know about the use of location data and are working closely with the privacy commissioner," said Geesche Jacobsen, a spokeswoman for the competition regulator. Oracle, according to The Australian newspaper, said Alphabet gets detailed information about people's internet searches and user locations if they have an Android phone.
Transferring that information to Google means using up gigabytes of data that consumers have paid for under data packages purchased from local telecom service providers, according to the Oracle report.