In the grand scheme of things, Google and its parent company Alphabet (GOOGL) -) have more than enough money to pay most fines it may incur, but the company's latest court settlement is definitely a win for privacy advocates.
Google agreed to pay the state of California $93 million to settle a lawsuit against the search engine for misleading consumers about its location tracking operations.
Related: The cost Google pays to maintain its dominance comes into focus in DOJ trial
California accused Google of deceiving people into believing that they maintained control over how Google collected and used their personal data.
The company was still able to profile and target users with location-based advertising whether they turned off their "location history" setting or not. The state also accused Google of deceiving people about their ability to block ads they did not want to see.
"Google was telling its users one thing — that it would no longer track their location once they opted out — but doing the opposite and continuing to track its users' movements for its own commercial gain," California Attorney General Rob Bonta said, according to Reuters.
"That's unacceptable."
Google did not admit any liability as part of the settlement.
This isn't the first time Google has just bitten the bullet and paid the fine for its alleged malfeasance.
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Last November, Google agreed to pay $391.5 million to resolve similar allegations about its location services that were brought in a class action by 40 U.S. states.
California was one of the states that decided to sue Google aside from the class action, along with Arizona and Washington, both of which have settled with the corporation.
After the nearly $400 million settlement, Google said that the lawsuits are based on old tech that it has already updated.
The fines are just a drop in the bucket for Google, however, as the search engine business alone brought in nearly $111 billion just in the first half of the year. The entire company made nearly $140 billion over that period, so a few hundred million is a small price to pay.
"We settled an investigation with 40 U.S. state attorneys general based on outdated product policies that we changed years ago. As well as a financial settlement, we will be making updates in the coming months to provide even greater controls and transparency over location data," the company said last year.
Alphabet is currently in the crosshairs of the federal government as the U.S. Department of Justice's antitrust trial against the company got underway this week.
"This case is about the future of the internet and whether Google's search engine will ever face meaningful competition," DOJ lawyer Kenneth Dintzer said.
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