Hoping to settle a lawsuit challenging its data collection practices, Google has agreed to destroy browser data it collected from users browsing in Chrome's private modes — which weren't as private as you might think.

The lawsuit [PDF], filed in June 2020, on behalf of plaintiffs Chasom Brown, Maria Nguyen and William Byatt, sought to hold Google liable for making misleading statements about privacy.

Specifically, the search behemoth's privacy policy claimed that users could control the information Google collects. But, as alleged in the lawsuit, Google did not provide the privacy it promised and implied through services like Chrome's incognito mode.

"Despite its representations that users have control over what information Google will track and collect, Google's various tracking tools, including Google Analytics and Google Ad Manager, are actually designed to automatically track users when they visit web pages – regardless of the settings a user chooses ,” the complaint alleges. "This is true even when a user is browsing in 'private browsing mode'."