Google scans non-users' emails for profit

As we’ve explained before, Google fights so hard for your data because the digital advertising market is huge and expanding. Revenue from digital advertising for the first half of 2016 totaled $32.7 billion, a 19 percent increase from the previous year. One way Google turns your data into money is by scanning emails you send over its email service, Gmail. It then uses that data to sell ads or to sell to others. Google would argue that your data is the price you pay for using the free service. But what if you don’t use the free service? Should Google be able to scan the data from non-users emails and sell it to advertisers?

Well, it did – Google scanned non-users’ emails to make a profit. A class action lawsuit filed at the end of 2015 alleges the company violated federal and state privacy laws by scanning the emails of non-Gmail users, who never agreed to Google’s privacy policy. “Google never obtained consent” from non-Gmail users “to catalog and analyze the contents of their emails,” Law360 reports. “The suit describes a thorough process by which Google allegedly extracts information from emails and keeps records it can use to better formulate specific, targeted advertising.”

The case is currently in the settlement phase, and the federal judge was displeased when Google tried to avoid making significant changes to its practice.

Links:

Here’s why Google fights so hard to get your data (Speed Matters, Nov. 7, 2016)

Google Faces New Privacy Class Claims Over Email Scanning (Law360, Sept. 8, 2015)

U.S. judge rejects Google email scanning settlement (Reuters, Mar. 16, 2017)