Chrome Users' Opening Brief Accuses Google of 'Clear, Broken Promises'

22-16993) in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Google’s first broken promise was that there was no need to provide one’s personal information to use Chrome, said the brief. Its second was that any personal information provided while using Chrome wouldn’t be sent to Google when the browser’s default “sync” setting was turned on, it said. As it turns out, Chrome did secretly send users’ personal information to Google, regardless of whether the sync mode was turned on or off, it said. These data transmissions “are detailed and intrusive,” it said. They reveal to Google “the content of communications that users exchange online and information that they submit to others,” from unemployment-benefit applications to political activities, the brief said. The district court wrongly granted summary judgment to Google on its consent defense, concluding as a matter of law that its disclosures “unambiguously informed a reasonable user that Chrome sent their personal information to Google regardless of sync status,” it said. The district court’s approach to consent “is untenable on multiple levels,” it said. Its holding can’t be reconciled “with longstanding, black-letter tort principles,” said the brief. It also “tramples” on the jury’s traditional role “in resolving questions about the existence and scope of consent.” If allowed to stand, the district court’s logic “would allow companies to obtain consent for all sorts of intrusive and unexpected privacy practices merely by obfuscating the mechanics behind those practices,” it said.