The FTC is harming consumers and discouraging transparency by imposing a penalty against Google as part...

for allegedly violating an earlier consent order and bypassing Safari privacy settings to collect information about users. The problem stems, Lenard wrote, from Google collecting information about users through the “+1” button that users can click to indicate that they like certain Web content. Lenard said users are inconvenienced and potentially more vulnerable now that Google disables the “+1” button by default. “Safari users who want to use +1 need to manually log in to their Google account, which equates to submitting a form, which then allows additional Google cookies to be installed anyway,” he wrote. “The pre-correction Google workaround meant that only additional cookies from Google’s Doubleclick network could be installed, while blocking cookies from any other third party.” The FTC, by accusing Google of acting contrary to the company’s policy laid out in a help center page from 2009, is encouraging other companies to be less transparent about their privacy practices, Lenard said. “The more transparent a company is about how it collects and uses data, the greater the risk of making a mistake and getting in trouble with the FTC,” he wrote. “So, companies will find it in their interest to give users less information about web site privacy practices."