Lyra Martin Tech 06.27.2022 05:Jun AM EDT

Google Analytics Has Been Banned in Three European Countries — What’s the Reason?

After several reports regarding Google Analytics' data infringement issues, three countries in Europe have prohibited its service.

In October next year, Google might suspend its Universal Analytics platform. At the same time, Google Analytics 4 will impossibly gain any favors from the EU.

Google's Google Analytics faces Dissension from UE after GDPR Breaches

Google has been under fire from the European Union for abusing its dominant position in mobile search engines and apps. The usage of Google Analytics is now being pursued by an increasing number of union member states for infringement of the General Data Protection Regulation.

The European Centre for Digital Rights (NOYB), a non-profit organization headquartered in Vienna, Austria, filed a complaint against Austrian medical news provider NetDoktor, where it all began. According to Wired, the business was discovered to utilize a cookie from Google Analytics, which records "the pages you read, how long you remain on the website, and information about your device," among other things. To connect the visitor to other navigational data, Google may provide an identifying number to the browser being used.

Additionally, all data recorded by Google through Google Analytics travels across the Atlantic from Europe to the United States. The Austrian Data Protection Agency (DPA) declared that the usage of Google Analytics breached GDPR on December 22, 2021. The "IP address anonymization feature was not correctly deployed," according to Natasha Lomas of TechCrunch. The user's IP address is a unique piece of information that may be used in conjunction with other information to identify them positively.

The third and most recent nation to prohibit the service that allows website owners to monitor and evaluate their site traffic is Italy. According to the government's judgment, the GDPR is violated since users are not guaranteed a fair procedure for redress because a vast amount of information, including IP addresses, is gathered through cookies and sent to the United States, where third parties, including the government, may access it.

Caffeina Media, a local supplier of online services, has been given 90 days by Italy's competition authorities to switch its account away from Google Analytics after receiving a citation.

Simple Analytics, a rival of Google Analytics, reports that two other member states have taken similar steps in a blog post. In February, the CNIL, France's national committee for freedom of expression, issued a ban for the same reason. In January, the Data Protection Authority of Austria did the same (via NOYB).

Google Eyes the Desist of Universal Analytics Platform in 2023

By October 2023, Google plans to discontinue the Universal Analytics platform, which mainly relies on trackers to gather information about site visits. The majority of Google Analytics customers presently use this platform. Google Analytics 4 is already online, but it's unlikely to win the E.U. any favors since it relaxes the use of trackers while still seeming to acquire much of the same data via alternative techniques. Over the last several years, Google has struggled to create new web trackers that respect user privacy.

The 'Schrems II' ruling from the Court of Justice of the European Union, which was rendered in 2020, is a significant source of support for the prohibition of Google Analytics. This generated obsolete prior guidelines under the Privacy Shield system, which guaranteed secure data transfers to the US. The whole judgment is available here.