Google in the crosshairs of the German antitrust: “give users more control over the data that is collected”

Google in the crosshairs of  German antitrust. The Federal Competition Office today published a preliminary statement of objection, accusing the American giant of not giving users sufficient freedom of choice in the management of their data.

Based on the current terms of service, we believe that Google does not provide its users with a sufficiently free choice as to whether and to what extent to accept such extensive profiling of their data. The choice options provided to date, where present, do not reflect the transparency requirements and are excessively generic

reads the press release published by the FTO .

This model would not only undermine consumer rights, but, according to the FTO, it would also damage free competition and other companies. Thus Andreas Mundt, president of the Bundeskartellamt: « Thanks to the wide access to user information collected through many different services, the company has a competitive advantage over other companies. The German competition authority is evaluating whether Google’s practices meet the requirements under the new competition rules for large digital companies.

The FTO will ask Google to review its policies and modify its current model to meet legal requirements, offering more choices to users regarding the profiling and management of their personal data.