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Google agreed to pay $1.375 billion to the State of Texas to resolve state privacy claims involving location data, Incognito browsing and biometric information. Texas announced the agreement in principle on May 9, 2025, and said it was signed and finalized on October 31, 2025. The official announcements describe a state enforcement settlement—not a consumer class action with an announced claims process or payments to individual Texans.
What the $1.375 billion settlement covers
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton brought privacy enforcement actions alleging that Google improperly collected or used Texans’ data in several distinct areas:
- Location information: Texas challenged Google’s collection or handling of geolocation and Location History data.
- Incognito browsing: The state raised claims about data collection connected with Chrome’s private-browsing mode.
- Biometric identifiers: Texas alleged collection of voiceprints and records of face geometry without legally sufficient consent.
These were allegations in state enforcement cases. The settlement resolves the claims; it is not a court finding that every alleged practice occurred as described. Texas’s finalization announcement summarizes the data categories and amount.
What Texas meant by “face scans”
The biometric allegations were more specific than the shorthand “Google scanned everyone’s face.” Texas’s complaint referred to “records of face geometry”—a machine-generated representation of facial features—which is legally and technically different from simply storing a photograph. The complaint alleged that facial-recognition features associated with Google Photos could process uploaded images or videos, and also named Google Assistant voiceprints and facial-recognition technology on Nest Hub Max devices. Those allegations do not establish that every Texas resident was scanned, or that Google sold face-geometry records to advertisers.
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The complaint invoked Texas’s Capture or Use of Biometric Identifier Act, commonly called CUBI. A 2022 announcement of the biometric lawsuit and the original petition describe the state’s claims and the products it named.
Timeline: from lawsuit to finalized agreement
- 2022: Texas sued Google over alleged collection and use of location, browsing and biometric information. The biometric case was one strand of the state’s broader privacy enforcement.
- May 9, 2025: Texas announced a $1.375 billion settlement in principle. That phrasing meant the deal had been reached in principle, not that the later finalization announcement had already occurred. See the May announcement.
- October 31, 2025: The attorney general’s office said Google had signed and finalized the agreement. It described the settlement as money secured for the State of Texas.
Finalization does not by itself tell readers when funds were transferred or how the state will use them. The official releases cited here do not establish a payment date or a program distributing the money to residents.
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Will Texans receive a payment?
No individual payout or claims process is identified in the official announcements for this $1.375 billion privacy settlement. Texas described the agreement as a settlement with the State of Texas. The releases do not give a per-person amount, eligibility rules, claim deadline, distribution formula or claims website. Do not assume that the settlement total will be divided among Texans or that you need to submit a claim.
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1Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsBe careful with emails, ads and websites promising a payment. Use an official Texas government source or a clearly identified court-appointed administrator to verify any claims program before sharing personal or financial information.
This case is easy to confuse with a separate $700 million Google Play antitrust settlement, for which Texas later published consumer-payment instructions. That is a different case and settlement, not a payout process for the privacy agreement. Texas’s Google Play payment announcement concerns that separate matter.
Did Google admit wrongdoing?
The available Texas announcements say the agreement resolves the state’s claims; they do not establish that a court found Google liable for every allegation. Contemporaneous reporting said Google’s position was that the deal resolved allegations without an admission of wrongdoing. The careful description is that Google agreed to pay to settle Texas’s claims—not that it admitted every alleged violation. The agreement should not be treated as proof of a judicial finding unless its specific terms or a court ruling say so.
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What the settlement does—and does not—mean
The settlement provides a financial resolution of Texas’s enforcement claims. On the information in the official announcements, it does not establish that Google discontinued every feature at issue, create an individual payment entitlement, or prove that all alleged conduct happened to every Texan. Location tracking, Incognito-related claims and biometric claims involve different data and legal theories; “face scans” alone is not an accurate summary of the whole case.
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Texas characterized the agreement as its largest recovery against Google for similar state privacy-law claims. The attorney general’s office compared it with a $93 million single-state settlement and a $391 million agreement involving a coalition of 40 states. Those are the state’s comparisons, rather than an independent ranking of all privacy settlements.
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Nor is this the separate Texas biometric case against Meta. Texas announced a $1.4 billion settlement with Meta in July 2024 over allegations involving unauthorized capture and use of Texans’ biometric data. It has a different defendant and case. See the Texas Meta announcement.
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