SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 9, 2018 (News Wires) - Google was supposed to be focusing Tuesday on its launch of a new smartphone and other devices, but the event was being overshadowed by a firestorm over a privacy glitch that forced it to shut down its struggling social network. The Silicon Valley giant said Monday it found and fixed a bug exposing private data in as many as 500,000 accounts, but drew fire for failing to disclose the incident. The revelation heightened concerns in Washington over privacy practices by Silicon Valley giants after a series of missteps by Facebook that could have leaked data on millions. "In the last year, we've seen Google try to evade scrutiny -- both for its business practices and its treatment of user data," Senator Mark Warner said in a statement. Warner said that despite "consent" agreements with the US Federal Trade Commission "neither company appears to have been particularly chastened in their privacy practices" and added that "it's clear that Congress needs to step in" for privacy protections. Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the latest breach suggests the FTC has failed to do its job in protecting user data. "The Congress needs to establish a data protection agency in the United States," Rotenberg said. "Data breaches are increasing but the FTC lacks the political will to enforce its own legal judgments."