European Data Authorities vs. Google

In order for Google to comply with European Union law, EU privacy regulators recommended to the company to make its privacy policies easier to find and understand, by publishing exhaustive lists of what data it holds and processes.

On September 23rd, EU addressed a letter  to Larry Page where asks Google to determine the means to achieve these legal requirements: "Google must meet its obligations with respect to the European and national data protection legal frameworks..."

Google received the package of recommendations from the Article 29 Working Party (WP29), a group of European data protection authorities. While WP29 has no power to sanction the company, its members have imposed fines in a number of cases following Google's 2012 changes to its privacy policy, which several national privacy regulators found breached EU rules.

The guidelines are just one way the company could comply with the law, and are not compulsory, but neither do they pre-empt enforcement actions by national authorities, the WP29 said, adding that it remains open to discussing any other measures that Google would propose to address the legal requirements.

The privacy policy should have clear, unambiguous and comprehensive information regarding data processing, including an exhaustive list of the types of personal data processed. In case that should prove too much information for some, WP29 also suggested personalizing the privacy policy for authenticated users, showing them only the data processing it is performing on their data.

Google must also provide users with more elaborate tools to manage their personal data and to control the usage of their personal data between all Google services, WP29 said. This could be done by making the current dashboard more accessible and including all Google services in that dashboard, in order to allow users to control the use of their personal data.

There is no deadline set for Google to respond to the suggestions of the group. The WP29 is considering issuing guidance on specific issues to the entire industry at a later stage.