The ban on all “behavioral advertising” imposed by Norway on Meta, parent company of the Facebook and Instagram platforms, will be extended to all EU and European Economic Area countries, the regulator announced on Wednesday European Data Protection Authority (EDPB). This practice, which consists of using the personal data of Internet users to submit targeted advertisements to them, is considered to contravene the European data regulation (GDPR).
A decision applicable within two weeks
This decision, applicable within two weeks, comes as the American technology giant announced on Monday that it was offering paid subscription plans to its European users who do not wish to see their data used, precisely in order to comply with EU regulations. . The Norwegian data regulator ordered Meta in mid-July to stop collecting, without explicit consent, the data of Facebook and Instagram users with the aim of sending them targeted advertisements, and has imposed a daily fine on it since mid-August.
The European Data Protection Board adopted last Friday “an urgent and binding decision” to extend this ban to the thirty countries of the European Economic Area (the 27 Member States of the EU, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein), he indicated in a press release. In practice, the EDPB asks the data regulator of Ireland, where Meta’s European headquarters is located, to take measures “within two weeks” to ban on Meta’s platforms “any processing of personal data for the purposes of behavioral advertising,” he says.
Towards new fines?
This “binding” decision was notified on Monday to Meta, which risks heavy fines in the event of non-compliance. Last May, the American group had already received a record fine of 1.2 billion euros from the Irish regulator, acting on behalf of the EU, for having violated the GDPR with its Facebook network – the fourth fine imposed to Meta in the EU in six months. The EDPB had estimated at the end of 2022 “that the contractual conditions (concluded with users of its platforms) do not constitute an appropriate legal basis for the processing of personal data carried out by Meta for the purposes of behavioral advertising”, explained the president of the European regulator, Anu Talus. “It is high time for Meta to bring its treatments into compliance and put an end to illicit treatments,” he insisted, quoted in the press release.
“Meta has already announced that we will give (European) citizens the opportunity to give their consent and, in November, we will offer a subscription model to comply with regulatory requirements,” a spokesperson for the American group reacted on Wednesday in a statement sent to AFP. “EDPB members have been aware of this project for weeks and we were already fully engaged with them to achieve an outcome satisfactory to all parties” and the decision announced on Wednesday “unjustifiably ignores this prudent regulatory process and robust,” he added.