Google is on the verge of settling with the Federal Trade Commission over privacy violations and could pay up to $22.5 million to the agency, the largest such fine ever applied to a single company, The Wall Street Journal reported on late Monday.
At issue is Google’s earlier practice of bypassing the security settings on the default Apple Safari web browser to enable Google to display “+1” buttons related to Google’s social network Google Plus on websites, as well allowing Google and other companies to place online advertising tracking cookies on users’ Apple devices. Google said it discontinued the practice after The Wall Street Journal first reported on it in February using a Stanford computer science researcher’s findings.
