A German data protection watchdog told Google on Tuesday to seek users' permission for creating data profiles from its various services, adding to pressure on the US technology giant in Europe over its privacy policy.
"Google is ordered to take the necessary technical and organisational measures to guarantee that their users can decide on their own if and to what extend their data is used for profiling," the data protection commissioner for the German city state of Hamburg said in a statement on Tuesday.
Commissioner Johannes Caspar said Google previously had refused to grant users more control over how it aggregates data across its services, including Gmail, smartphones operating system Android and the Web search engine.
Data protection in Germany is mainly handled by its regional states, but the Hamburg watchdog said it represented Germany as part of a European task force evaluating Google's privacy policy.
Processing data that reveals financial wealth, sexual orientation and relationship status, among other aspects of private life, is unlawful in Germany unless users give their explicit consent, it added.
Google spokesmen in Europe did not immediately respond to requests by phone and e-mail for comment.
The Financial Times earlier quoted a company spokesman as saying Google was studying the order to determine next steps.
European data privacy regulators last week handed the US group a package of guidelines to help it bring the way it collects and stores user data in line with EU law.
Regulators in six European countries: Italy, France, Spain, Germany, Britain and the Netherlands, have opened investigations into Google after it consolidated its 60 privacy policies into one and started combining data collected on individual users across its services, including YouTube, Gmail and Google Maps.
Data encryption
Joining a cry from law enforcement officials concerned about data encryption on Apple's newest operating system, US attorney general Eric Holder said on Tuesday that officers should not be blocked from the information they need to investigate a crime.
Apple's new iPhone 6, released this month, and Google's coming update of the Android smartphone, have data encryption so sophisticated that only the user may unlock it. Even law enforcement officers with search warrants would not have access.
"It is fully possible to permit law enforcement to do its job while still adequately protecting personal privacy," Holder said in a speech before the Global Alliance Against Child Sexual Abuse Online.
Holder said quick access to phone data can help law enforcement officers find and protect victims, such as those targeted by kidnappers and sexual predators.
Justice Department officials said Holder is merely asking for co-operation from the companies at this time.
Holder's comments echo concerns raised last week by FBI director James Comey.
"What concerns me about this is companies marketing something expressly to allow people to place themselves beyond the law," he said.
Comey said agents at the FBI have had conversations with Apple and Google to better understand the technology.
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