With the FCC deciding it could not take action against Google over its collection of data from unsecured Wi-Fi, Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), co-chair of the House privacy caucus, has called for a congressional hearing on that data collection.
"The circumstances surrounding Google's surreptitious siphoning of personal information leave many unanswered questions. I believe Congress should immediately hold a hearing to get to the bottom of this serious situation," Markey said late Tuesday in a statement.
The statement was in response to the FCC's $25,000 fine, which was not for the privacy breach but for what the FCC said was Google's uncooperativeness in the FCC's investigation. Google countered that it had cooperated.
Google has maintained all along that the data collection was a mistake, but not illegal.
In May 2010, Markey and others asked Google to explain the collection.
"We believe it does not violate U.S. law to collect payload data from networks that are configured to be openly accessible (i.e., not secured by encryption and thus accessible by any user's device)," the company said in response. "We emphasize that being lawful and being the right thing to do are two different things, and that collecting payload data was a mistake for which we are profoundly sorry."
