Google's appeal to dismiss a lower court's decision pertaining to Google's Street View violation of the U.S. Wiretap Act was rejected by the Supreme Court on Monday.

The case began in 2010 when Google admitted to having inadvertently collected private users' information over unsecured WiFi networks during its data gathering process where Street View cars drove and surveyed networks in order to provide end users with a 3D pictorial view of actual streets, according to Salon.com.

Like Us on Facebook

"Payload data" in over 30 countries were collected that included private usernames, passwords, images and emails.

The tech giant apologized for the incident and said it stopped its data gathering, destroyed all accidentally collected data and vowed that none were used in any of its products or services.

However, it was not enough to appease the public as investigations and lawsuits soon followed.

Last year, Google reached a $7 million settlement with 38 states over the data collections while other countries launched their own investigations into the incident.

Google appealed for the dismissal of the 9^th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeal's decision arguing that the data collected was gathered over radio communications, a provision not covered in the Wiretap Act. Moreover, it said that the information was gathered over unsecured WiFi networks, thereby not covered by the wiretap rules, according to PC World.

The Supreme Court refused to hear the case and refused Google's petition, meaning that the lawsuit will continue to a lower court where it will be determined whether the case will qualify as a class action, Gigaom explained.

However, it should also be noted that the tech firm may decide to settle the case.

"We're disappointed that the Supreme Court has declined to hear the case," said a Google spokesperson.

Meanwhile, legal proceedings filed by private citizens against Google under the federal Wiretap Act are still underway.

TagsTransport Science Technology, Wiretap Act, Wiretap Law, cybercrime, cyber espionage, cyber snooping