The European Union has once again cracked down on Meta’s excessive use of user information. The EU Court of Justice, the highest EU court, ruled that Meta and other social media platforms should be placed on limits on how long they can use personal information for ad targeting strategies.
The EU’s highest court issued a decision in line with an earlier opinion published by a court advisor in April, TechCrunch reported. This previous decision also argued that there should be limits on how long companies can keep customers’ personal data for ad targeting purposes.
The decision reminded the rules regarding the retention period of data, referring to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) that the EU put into effect in 2018. Article 65 of the GDPR guarantees individuals’ “right to be forgotten” and the right to correction and deletion of personal data. Companies that fail to comply with GDPR can be fined up to 4 percent of their global annual turnover.
This rate can reach billions of dollars for a giant social media company like Meta. Last year, Meta had to pay a fine of $414 million (about 390 million euros) for requiring users to accept personalized ads on its platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.
EU Court and big tech companies often clash
The EU and Meta, along with other major tech companies such as Apple and Google, have long clashed over the use of personal data under the Digital Markets Act. Meta is facing a new fine for violating the Digital Markets Act for requiring users to pay to prevent their personal data from being collected and shared. Last year, the EU Court of Justice ruled that Meta must obtain consent from users in the region before serving them personal ads.