European Union slaps massive fine on Facebook parent company Meta for sharing its data with USA

Facebook parent company Meta has been fined a record 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion) for sharing the EU data with the United States in breach of a previous court ruling, Ireland’s regulator announced on Monday.

The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) which acts on behalf of the European Union, said the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) has directed the body to collect “an administrative fine” of 1.2 billion euros.

The DPC has been investigating the transfer of EU data to USA via Meta Ireland since 2020. As a result of which, it has concluded that Meta, which has its European headquarter in Dublin, Ireland, failed to address the “risks of fundamental rights and freedoms of data and subjects” that were identified in a previous ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).

The CJEU interprets EU law to make sure that the same law is applied in the same way in all member states.

In response to the ruling, Meta has expressed disappointment and claimed “to have been singled out.” The tech giant also alleged that the ruling was “flawed, unjustified and sets a dangerous precedent for the countless other companies.”