There could be around 1 million legitimate claims from the class, with each member awarded between $20 to $30 over Google’s data collection practices on YouTube.
SAN JOSE, Calif. (CN) — A federal judge granted final approval for a $30 million class action settlement against Google on Tuesday, after six years of litigation with parents claiming the tech giant violated children’s privacy by collecting data while they watched YouTube videos.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan van Keulen did not sway from the plaintiffs’ proposed settlement filed last September, granting the class members the right to a monetary award.
During the Tuesday settlement hearing, class member counsel Steven Bloch told the court there could be around 1 million legitimate claims from the class, with each member awarded between $20 to $30, after attorney fees and expenses.
Van Keulen reserved $9 million, or 30% of the settlement fund, for attorney fees. The judge said the award was “reasonable and fair” due to the 9,000 hours of work the plaintiffs’ attorneys did, and the risk of coming up with nothing for the class members.
Van Keulen also awarded $1,500 for each representative guardian in the case, totaling $27,000.
The certified class includes “all persons in the United States who were under 13 years old, and watched content allegedly directed to children on YouTube between July 1, 2013 to April 1, 2020.”
During the multiyear litigation, van Keulen found that the plaintiffs adequately claimed “highly offensive” conduct by Google with respect to privacy. YouTube is owned by Google.
The families and their children first filed the class action in 2019, claiming that Google violated the privacy of minors by collecting personal information while they watched YouTube videos.
They claimed that the company used the information, which included their IP addresses, device serial numbers, geolocation data and other details, to more effectively advertise to minors.
Although Google doesn’t charge for access to YouTube, the company does use it as a revenue source. It collaborates with advertisers and the owners of popular YouTube channels to advertise on specific videos, with Google and the channel owners splitting the payments received from advertisers.
The families also accused channel owners of “baiting” vulnerable children by using cartoons, nursery rhymes and other child-directed content to entice them to view YouTube channels to further their goals of collecting data without parental consent.
The judge declined to hold responsible the owners of popular YouTube channels initially named in the lawsuit, like Dreamworks Animation, Cartoon Network and Hasbro, stating that their conduct as content creators wasn’t enough to “sufficiently tie” them to Google’s supposed wrongful data collection, as they had not collected any data themselves.
In July 2024, the court dismissed all the plaintiffs’ claims with only limited leave to amend.
Over the last six years in court, the class action grew. In their most recent complaint, filed in August 2024, the plaintiffs brought 42 claims under the laws of 18 different states.
In January 2025, van Keulen found the plaintiffs properly claimed that Google collected and held on to protected consumer data without permission, allowing damages claims to proceed based on consumer protection laws in Indiana, Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
She also allowed claims for injunctive relief to remain over laws from Florida, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire and Tennessee.
To alert class members of the settlement, notice included a media plan with press releases, a website, a toll-free number and an email contact.
At Tuesday’s hearing, van Keulen said the settlement was a product of “extensive arms-length negotiations and mediation sessions.”
However, the judge said she was concerned about fraudulent claims for reward, saying prior and similar class actions were the “subject of some press” after an “alarming number” of claims were found to be fake, and questioned if final approval of the settlement should happen before the audit process.
Bloch said the claims administrator for the case was an expert in tracking claims, including using algorithms as part of the process.
Google attorney Adam Cooke concurred with Bloch.
“We were cognizant of this potential of fraudulent claims from the beginning,” he said.
“We feel comfortable of the process,” noting the claims window will close in about a week.
Attorneys representing the plaintiffs and Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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