Google's privacy policy violates Dutch data protection law
Google's practice of combining personal data from different Google services violates the Dutch data protection act, the Dutch data protection authority (DPA) said Thursday. But Google will not face any enforcement actions for now.
In March 2012, Google introduced a new privacy policy that allows Google to share personal data across all its products and services. However, Google made the changes without having adequately informed users, and without asking for their consent, the Dutch DPA said in a news release.
"The investigation shows that Google does not properly inform users which personal data the company collects and combines, and for what purposes," it said. By doing this, Google "spins an invisible web of our personal data, without our consent," which is forbidden by law, the DPA said.