Meta’s Facebook fined a record €1.2 billion for mishandling data transfers in the EU

The Data Protection Commission (DPC) of Ireland, which oversees the GDPR, announced a €1.2 billion fine against Meta, the parent company of the social media giant. The DPC stated in a statement that Facebook had violated its rules requiring platforms to ensure appropriate safeguards are in place for data transfers from the EU to the US. The European Data Protection Board had instructed it to collect “an administrative fine of 1.2 billion euros,” the Irish watchdog said in a statement announcing its imposition of the penalty on behalf of European regulators.”

The fine came four months after the Irish DPC imposed a €390 million fine on Meta for unlawful personalised advertising on Facebook and Instagram. In the last two years, the Irish regulator has imposed four fines ranging from €405 million to €225 million on Meta’s platforms, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, reports Technology News UK.

This time, the DPC found that despite an earlier ruling by the EU’s Court of Justice requiring that it better protect individuals’ information from intrusive US surveillance programmes, Facebook’s EU-US data flows relied on contractual provisions that “did not address the risks to the fundamental rights and freedoms” of users.