Google will pay the State of Connecticut more than a half million dollars as part of a multi-state settlement over the internet company's street view collection of WiFi data.
State Attorney General George Jepsen announced the $7 million settlement Tuesday in Hartford. He said data was collected without people knowing about it.
As the street view cars were snapping pictures they were also collecting data from unsecured wireless networks, according to Jepsen.
The AG's office conducted a two-year investigation.
"Everybody knew the street view cars were out there," Matthew Fitzsimmons, an assistant attorney general, said. "Everybody knew they were taking pictures but nobody knew that they were also out there taking this kind of information."
For its part, Google said they never wanted the data and didn't use it or even look at it.
"We work hard to get privacy right at Google," a company spokesperson said in statement to NBC Connecticut. "But in this case we didn't, which is why we quickly tightened up our systems to address the issue."
As part of the settlement, Google will run public service announcements which will teach people how to encrypt their wireless networks.
Jepsen said the settlement isn't about the money.
"The real goal was to protect the consumers," he said.
38 states and the District of Columbia signed the agreement with Google to resolve their consumer protection and privacy claims.
