Google’s ‘Incognito’ Inspires Staff Jokes -- and a Big Lawsuit

On International Data Privacy Day last year, an email popped into Alphabet Inc. Chief Executive Sundar Pichai’s inbox from Google’s marketing chief Lorraine Twohill full of ideas on gaining user trust.

“Make Incognito Mode truly private,” she wrote in a bullet point. “We are limited in how strongly we can market Incognito because it’s not truly private, thus requiring really fuzzy, hedging language that is almost more damaging.”

Now, billions of dollars in damages could be at stake in a consumer lawsuit targeting the private-browsing feature if a judge agrees Tuesday to let the case proceed as a class ...