Six European regulators to act over Google’s privacy policy

Regulators from six European countries are planning to act against Google Inc to force the US internet giant to comply with the European Union (EU) privacy rules.

French data protection agency  Cnil said in a statement today data protection authorities from France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the UK will launch coordinated and simultaneous enforcement actions against Google for not bringing its privacy policy in line with European regulations.

Early last year, European data protection authorities set up a working party to check whether Google's newly amended privacy policy is in line with the European Data Protection Directive

In October 2012, the working party highlighted deficiencies in Google's privacy policy and gave some recommendations to Google on how to address these. It gave the company four months to implement the changes or risk sanctions.

Cnil said that Google has not taken any precise measures in response to those recommendations and the six European data protection authorities will act according to their competences and powers.

In March 2012, Google launched its new privacy policy, which allowed it to track and merge user's information across various services such as Gmail, YouTube, Google+, Android operated mobile devices, social networks and Internet search to develop targeted advertising.

The company justified the changes by saying that it was necessary to provide clarity to users, and to improve its services.

The new policy drew sharp criticism from the US and European consumer advocacy groups as well as from the European regulators who were concerned since Google holds a 80 per cent share of the internet search market, while more than 70 per cent of smartphones sold worldwide are based on Google's Android operating system.

But the EU data protection regulators can impose a maximum fine of €300,000, which is a drop to Google's estimated annual turnover of €50 billion.