What just happened? Google has agreed to pay $68 million to settle a class-action lawsuit accusing its voice assistant of unlawfully recording private conversations and sharing them in ways that may have been used for targeted advertising.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Jose, California, centers on what are known in the industry as "false accepts" – instances where Google Assistant is alleged to have activated and recorded ambient speech without users explicitly saying wake words "Hey Google" or "OK Google."
Plaintiffs claimed those inadvertent recordings were then used to help inform personalized ads and other content, raising serious questions about implicit surveillance and consent.
Google has denied any wrongdoing throughout the litigation, framing the settlement as a way to avoid the uncertainty, cost, and distraction of a drawn-out legal battle rather than an admission of liability – a common tactic in the world of tech litigation.
The settlement, which includes allegations going as far back as 2016, allows affected users to file claims based on the number of devices they own or interactions they've had with Google Assistant over the years.
Details about the exact payout per person vary depending on how many people participate, but those figures will likely be modest on a per-claimant basis. Legal fees for the plaintiffs' counsel could account for up to a third of the total fund, according to filings.
Concerns about how tech giants collect and monetize personal data in the name of convenience are nothing new. While voice assistants have become staples in everything from phones to smart speakers, the fine print of when and how conversations are processed – and what happens to that data – has remained unclear to many users.
Google announced last year that all Android devices were switching to Gemini as their default assistant and "the classic Google Assistant will no longer be accessible on most mobile devices." But generative AI assistants come with their own problems, including the familiar privacy issues.
The case isn't unique to Google. At the start of 2025, Apple agreed to pay $95 million to settle a five-year-old lawsuit accusing its digital assistant Siri of eavesdropping on people's private conversations on iPhones and other devices. Like Google, Apple denied any wrongdoings, despite handing over the money.