A U.S. federal jury on Wednesday ordered Google to pay approximately $425 million in compensation to about 100 million of its users for collecting data related to their use of apps on their smartphones without their consent.

At the conclusion of the trial that began in mid-August, the jury at the federal court in San Francisco found that Google violated the privacy of users who had chosen in their app settings not to allow the search giant to track their activities on these apps, yet Google continued to record their data.

The internet giant quickly announced its intention to appeal the guilty verdict.

The case stems from a class action lawsuit filed in July 2020.

The plaintiffs, approximately 98 million of whom were recognized by the court, had disabled the “Web & App Activity” setting and another subsidiary setting to track their online activities, meaning they refused to allow Google to collect data generated from their use of services such as Chrome browser, Google Maps, and Google News.

During the trial, the plaintiffs’ lawyers said, “Google’s privacy promises and guarantees are blatant lies.”

Commenting on the ruling, José Castaneda, Google’s spokesperson, told AFP by phone, “This decision misunderstands how our products work, and we will appeal it.”

He added, “Our privacy tools allow users to control their data, and when they disable personalization, we respect their choice.”

Google says that data collected after disabling tracking settings does not allow identification of users.