Google’s €403 million Irish DPC fine is just a retroactive GDPR subscription fee.

So the Irish DPC finally finished their paperwork and fined Google €403 million for the location tracking mess from 2018 to 2020. (Source: The Business and Human Rights Centre)

Google already put out the standard PR line. They claim this is a historical issue and they updated their tools years ago. Which is exactly the point. They used dark patterns to trick people into leaving Location History and Web & App Activity turned on for two years. They got the data they wanted. Paying a few hundred million euros half a decade later is just a late fee for ignoring GDPR. It is a simple line item on their quarterly budget.

If you want to actually control your location data, waiting for European regulators to wake up is a terrible strategy. You need technical isolation.

Revoke network permissions for Google Play Services. Flash a custom ROM if your hardware allows it. At the very least, run a DNS blocker to drop their telemetry domains. The only valid consent is a dropped packet.