Google is preparing to pay $68 million to settle a class action lawsuit alleging that it secretly recorded private conversations on Android users’ phones.
The lawsuit centers on Google Assistant, a virtual assistant available on many Android devices.
Plaintiffs allege the assistant recorded private conversations after being inadvertently activated and that the recordings were shared with advertisers to support targeted advertising.
Google Assistant is designed to remain in standby mode until it detects an activation phrase such as “Hey Google.”
Once activated, the device records audio and sends it to Google servers for processing.
Google states that no audio is sent while the assistant remains in standby mode.
The lawsuit claims the assistant sometimes activates unintentionally when it mistakenly interprets background speech as
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