Google News is using background data without warning users

Launched in 2002, the Google News  is the platform created by Google as a news aggregator, also available in an application for Android e  iOS systems. In it, the user can choose a keyword or subject to be notified whenever it is mentioned in any website news. But therein lies the problem that has arisen recently.

According to reports in the help forum of this platform, dozens of people claim that the app for Android would be consuming a large amount of data in background, causing additional costs on the internet bill.

The company responsible for Google News reported that the bugs has already been fixed, but users say otherwise. Understand what happened and know what this problem caused:

Application worked in the background

The forum reports started in June this year, but the Google seems to have just become aware of it now. The app was consuming closest Internet than it should, but in background. It was working in the same way as some messaging apps, where it continues to run on the operating system even though it is not open in the foreground.

O Google News  is configured to work this way, so that the news can be read without necessarily having an internet connection, as the article was previously loaded. If the user wishes, he can configure the download to be done only on Wi-Fi networks.

Even so, the app was not working properly, and it had a bug that used the internet provided by telephone operators, despite the settings for Wi-Fi. This means that in addition to using more data than it should, it was still not following the settings made by the user. This problem caused additional expenses that people did not expect.

O bugs on Google News that cost $385

Another unidentified person reported in the Help Forum  that close to 24GB was used by Google News , causing a additional cost of $385. Another reported that the app used about 12GB of mobile data in one night.

the reader of The Verge, Zach Dowle, claimed that he turned off his device's Wi-Fi when he went to sleep, and the app continued using 3G. Many anonymous users reported on the forum that they had additional costs because the data pack was completely used by the application. One person said that the Google News  used 7.65GB internet, resulting in US$ 240 more in the account.

Google's answer

After so many complaints the Google has spoken about the subject.  Lisa Wang, development team representative Google news, wrote a small statement talking about what happened, but did not give details on when the problem will end. she first thanked for the warning, and said the team will work to get this resolved as quickly as possible.

The communiqué also informs that all information sobre or bugs be posted the same forum. Nothing was said about the additional costs that people had, and still it is not known whether the company will pay for it or not. The company is expected to do something, not to let these users with one bad impression sobre or Google. 

How to avoid the Google News bug

The bug has not yet been fixed by the Google, and there is no prediction of when this might be resolved. If you were affected by bugs, or want to prevent this from happening, you can deactivate your application settings that allow the background data usage.

This can be done by following these steps: Settings > Apps & notifications > App info > Google News > Data usage. Then, uncheck the “Background data” option.

If you choose the option above, you will no longer be notified by the app if any important news is published. Uninstalling the app is also a great option, but you'll have to keep an eye out for updates on the Google News . In all cases, only an update will resolve this issue. bugs, so the company needs to be fast so as not to lose app users.

Sources: The Verge e 9to5Google.

Have you been affected by the problem of Google News? What do you think of these errors that affect apps? Tell us in the comments!