In July 2019, Belgian broadcaster VRT NWS obtained over 1,000 Google Assistant recordings from a contractor, many captured without the wake word being spoken. Recordings included bedroom conversations, phone calls with sensitive information, and domestic arguments. Google acknowledged that contractors listen to about 0.2% of all audio snippets — which amounts to millions of recordings given the scale. Google settled a $68 million lawsuit for recording users without proper consent. The company had failed to disclose that human contractors reviewed recordings.