Three Senate Democrats asked Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chairman Joseph Simons in an Oct. 10 letter to open an investigation into Google’s disclosure earlier this week that it discovered and patched in March a vulnerability in its Google+ social media platform that may have exposed profile data on up to 500,000 accounts, but did not inform users of the vulnerability in a timely way. Sens. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., Edward Markey, D-Mass., and Tom Udall, D-N.M., asked FTC Chairman Simons to “conduct a vigorous review whether the Google+ incident constitutes a breach” of the company’s previous consent decree with FTC, and “more broadly whether Google has engaged in deceptive acts and practices with respect to privacy.” They said that it the FTC “finds problematic conduct, we encourage you to act decisively to end this pattern of behavior through substantial financial penalties and strong legal remedies.”
