Swedish Regulator Cautions Against Utilizing Google Analytics

The Swedish Authority for Privacy Protection (IMY) has cautioned companies about utilizing Google Analytics, a widely used tool for monitoring website traffic and recognizing patterns. This tool enables tracking of website performance and offers valuable insights into visitor demographics and behavior. Additionally, Google Analytics seamlessly integrates with other Google products like Google Console and Google Ads, allowing for data tracking across various channels. Nevertheless, IMY has recently imposed fines and advised against using Google’s free web analytics service due to concerns regarding user data exports.

Violation of privacy laws

In a statement, the watchdog has revealed that it has found that the level of protection that Google applies to the data of European users exported to the United States is not sufficient. Sweden’s data protection authority inspected four companies after receiving complaints from None of Your Business (NOYB) that these companies violated the law by exporting personal data to the United States. DON, Coop, Dagens Industri and Tele2 were audited to know how they use Google Analytics for web statistics.

The report revealed that safeguards failed to meet the required legal standard, resulting in fines of $30,000 for online entertainment retailer CDON and a whopping $1.1 million for Swedish internet service provider Tele2. In connection with the export of data to countries outside the EU/EEA, a violation of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) data protection regulations was also found, but no fines were imposed in these cases.

The Swedish Data Protection Authority said in a statement: “The Swedish Data Protection Authority (IMY) has inspected how four companies use Google Analytics for online statistics. The IMY imposes administrative fines on two companies. One of the companies has recently stopped using the statistics tool on its own initiative, while the IMY orders three others to stop using it as well.

What is Google Analytics?

Google Analytics is a free web analytics service for tracking website traffic. It allows you to view data across platforms, predict user behavior, gather insights, and predict future customer actions using machine learning.