Google Blasted By Danish Watchdog Over Uncapped TIme Storage Of Personal Data

Google has come under fire from a Danish watchdog for not capping the amount of time the search company stores its users’ personal data on its servers.

The watchdog has asked the Danish Data Protection Agency to look into whether Google’s parent company Alphabet is potentially breaking privacy laws pertaining to the data storage, Reuters reports.

Data dilemma

“The consumer council Taenk would like the Data Protection Agency to assess whether Google’s indefinite data collection complies with consumer’s basic right to privacy,” the watchdog said in a report seen by Reuters.

“We have become aware of the fact that Google today has 9-10 years of data on users with a Google account.”

Little information regarding the issues has surfaced, nor any details as to why the watchdog was prompted to probe Google’s data storage practices.

However, many web companies, such as Facebook, alongside Google, come under a lot of fire from watchdogs and antitrust agencies, which often see the ability for the companies to establish dominance in European markets as the establishment of an unfair monopoly.

Google has in particular, been under the scrutiny of the European Commission several times over the way it serves search results or handles native apps on Android smartphones.

And the removal of the Safe Harbour rule, meant that web and cloud companies have had to be particularly careful on storing the data of their European users within the confines of the European Union.

The ruling was replaced with Privacy Shield, which allows companies to transfer EU citizen data to US servers providing they ensure it is protected. However, there have been numerous issues with the data protection framework that have left European privacy watchdogs less than satisfied.

The dogged pursuit of the likes of Google by the European Commission and various agencies and watchdogs, demonstrated that Europe takes its citizens privacy and consumer welfare very seriously, perhaps in comparison to other nations, such as the US which has no qualms in forcing companies to part with private data when it can be linked with terrorist and criminal investigations.

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