Google and Privacy: 6 EU Countries Take Action
PARIS — Google’s new privacy policy is under attack from regulators in its largest European markets, who on Tuesday brought legal action to try and force the company to overhaul practices they say let it create a data goldmine at the expense of unwitting users. Led by the French, organizations in Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, Spain and Italy agreed Tuesday on the joint action, with the ultimate possibility of imposing fines or restrictions on operations across the entire 27-country European Union. Last year the company merged 60 separate privacy policies from around the world into one universal procedure. The European organizations complain that the new policy doesn’t allow users to figure out which information is kept, how it is combined by Google services, or how long the company retains it. (MORE: Google Glass Will Be Made in the USA by Foxconn) The fines’ financial impact on Google would be limited — French privacy watchdog CNIL has the right to fine the company up to ...
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HSBC to Pay $249M to Settle Foreclosure-Abuse Case
(WASHINGTON) — British bank HSBC will pay $249 million to settle federal complaints that its U.S. division wrongfully foreclosed on homeowners who should have been allowed to stay in their homes. The agreement with the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is similar to deals with 12 other banks that ended a review of loan files required under a 2011 federal action. Combined, the 13 banks will pay $9.3 billion. The settlements could compensate Americans whose homes were seized because of abuses such as “robo-signing,” when banks automatically signed off on foreclosures without properly reviewing documents. The agreement will also help eliminate huge potential liabilities for the banks. (MORE: Bank of America’s Earnings Shrink on Mortgage Settlements) Consumer advocates say regulators settled for too low a price by letting banks avoid full responsibility for foreclosures that victimized families. Under the settlement, HSBC will pay $96 million in cash compensation ...
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Did Google’s Promise to ‘Do No Evil’ Convince the FTC to Do Nothing About Its Search Bias?
Has the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) been seduced by Google’s famous promise to “do no evil?” That’s the question a lot of critics are asking in the wake of the Internet search giant’s antitrust settlement with the FTC last week. The problem, critics say, isn’t simply that Google got off lightly; it’s that the FTC allowed Google to set the terms – both in defining whether the company’s behavior was harmful and in setting the terms of its punishment. “For critics of Google,” NYU Information Law Institute Fellow Nathan Newman writes on the Huffington Post, “[the] FTC decision is not bad news because we disagree with the results, but bad news because it reflects an enforcement agency failing to even ask the right questions.” (MORE: What Google’s FTC Deal Means for the Patent Wars) One of the central questions in the FTC’s antitrust investigation was how exactly to determine whether Google’s dominance in the search engine business has caused harm – and to ...
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Did Google’s Promise to “Do No Evil” Convince the FTC to Do Nothing About its Search Bias?
Has the Federal Trade Commission been seduced by Google’s famous promise to “do no evil?” That’s the question a lot of critics are asking in the wake of the Internet search giant’s antitrust settlement with the FTC last week. The problem, critics say, isn’t simply that Google got off lightly; it’s that the FTC allowed Google to set the terms – both in defining whether the company’s behavior was harmful and in setting the terms of its punishment. “For critics of Google,” NYU Information Law Institute Fellow Nathan Newman writes on the Huffington Post, “[the] FTC decision is not bad news because we disagree with the results, but bad news because it reflects an enforcement agency failing to even ask the right questions.” (MORE: What Google’s FTC Deal Means for the Patent Wars) One of the central questions in the FTC’s antitrust investigation was how exactly to determine whether Google’s dominance in the search engine business has caused harm – and to whom? ...
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10 Banks Agree to Pay $8.5B for Foreclosure Abuse
(WASHINGTON) — Ten major banks and mortgage companies agreed Monday to pay $8.5 billion to settle federal complaints that they wrongfully foreclosed on homeowners who should have been allowed to stay in their homes. The banks, which include JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo, will pay billions to homeowners to end a review process of foreclosure files that was required under a 2011 enforcement action. The review was ordered because banks mishandled people’s paperwork and skipped required steps in the foreclosure process. Under the new settlement, people who were wrongfully foreclosed on could receive from $1,000 up to $125,000. Failing to offer someone a loan modification would be considered a lighter offense; unfairly seizing and selling a person’s home would entitle that person to the biggest payment, according to guidelines released last summer by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Monday’s settlement was announced jointly by the OCC and the Federal reserve. ...
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