NRW consumer center sues Google over cookie banner

The consumer association Verbraucherzentrale Nordrhein-Westfalen is taking legal action against the US technology giant Google before the Berlin Regional Court over its cookie banners. “With tricks in the design of cookie banners, companies try to trick consumers into giving their consent in order to obtain, collect and process as much personal information as possible,” said Wolfgang Schuldzinski, executive director of the NRW consumer center, on Wednesday, explaining the reason for the proceedings. It must be just as easy to reject cookies as to accept them, he said, in order to prevent the careless disclosure of data. This is not the case with Google’s search engine websites, he said.