American multinational Meta Platforms, the owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has been slapped with a fine of 1,200 million euros by the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) in connection with the transfer of personal data of its users from the European Union. United States of america.
Meta Ireland has been ordered to suspend any future transfers of personal data to the US, the largest ever fine for breaching EU privacy rules, surpassing the $746 million fine imposed on Amazon by Luxembourg authorities is also required. .Within five months from the date of notification of the decision of the DPC.
Irish authorities, who launched an investigation in August 2020, concluded that the data transfer by the multinational was in breach of Article 46 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), noting that in these circumstances, the data transfer should be suspended .
“The decision records that Meta Ireland violated Article 46 of the GDPR when it transferred personal data from the EU/EEA to the United States following the issuance of the CJEU decision in the case of Commissioner for Data Protection against Facebook Ireland Limited and Maximilian Schrems continued”, exclaims the Irish authority.
In this sense, it indicates that although Meta Ireland carried out those transfers on the basis of the updated Standard Contract Clauses (SCC), which were adopted by the European Commission in 2021 with additional complementary measures implemented by Meta Ireland, ” The DPC found that these arrangements fail to address the risks to the fundamental rights and freedoms of interested parties as identified by the CJEU in its judgment”.
