Euro watchdog will attempt to extract $ 900 million from Amazon for violating data privacy laws • The Register



[ad_1]

Amazon says a European Union privacy watchdog has been reckless in demanding a fine of $ 885 million for breaching data privacy rules.

“On July 16, 2021, the Luxembourg National Commission for Data Protection (CNPD) issued a decision against Amazon Europe Core S.à rl claiming that the processing of personal data by Amazon did not comply with the EU general data protection regulation, “the goliath web said in a financial brief accompanying its report on second quarter 2021 results [PDF] Thursday.

“The decision imposes a fine of 746 million euros [$885m] and corresponding reviews of the practice. “

Amazon said the CNPD’s decision had no basis and that it planned to challenge the decision.

“Maintaining the security of our customers’ information and their trust are top priorities,” Amazon said in an emailed statement to The register. “There has been no data breach and no customer data has been exposed to a third party. These facts are undisputed. We strongly disagree with the CNPD’s decision and intend to appeal. “

“The decision as to how we show customers relevant advertisements is based on subjective and untested interpretations of EU privacy law, and the proposed fine is grossly disproportionate with even that interpretation.”

The fine of 746 million euros is the heaviest sanction under the 2018 GDPR to date, nearly 15 times exceeding the previous fine of 50 million euros imposed by the National Commission for Informatics and Freedoms (CNIL) to Google in 2019. In fact, Amazon’s fine is more than double the sum of all previous GDPR penalties combined (€ 303 million).

The decision follows the CNPD’s investigation into a complaint of May 28, 2018 [PDF] by La Quadrature du Net, a French privacy group. The complaint contends that Amazon subjects website visitors to behavioral-targeted advertisements, but does not disclose this practice in its terms of service and does not seek consent to use personal information to serve targeted advertisements.

The privacy group attacked Amazon’s public statement about no data breach as a non sequitur, saying the CNPD’s decision is a consequence of invasive ads rather than intrusion into the database.

This historic fine goes straight to the heart of Big Tech’s predatory system, and should be celebrated as such

“It is the targeted advertising system itself, and not just the occasional security flaws, that our lawsuit has attacked,” the group said in a statement posted on its website. “This historic fine goes right to the heart of Big Tech’s predatory system and should be celebrated as such.”

The privacy group also took the opportunity to oppose the massive fine of the CNPD against the failure of the Irish Data Protection Authority and the CNIL to translate the group’s complaints against Facebook, Apple, Microsoft and Google in significant penalties. And he celebrated the CNPD’s decision for restoring confidence in regulatory intervention.

“Business models based on the domination and exploitation of our privacy and our free consent are worryingly illegitimate and go against the values ​​our democratic societies claim to uphold,” the group said.

Elsewhere in its 10-Q record, Amazon reported revenue of $ 113.1 billion and operating profit of $ 7.7 billion for the quarter. ®

[ad_2]

Source link