Italy fines Meta 805 million euros over photo privacy violations
The Italian data privacy authority Garante imposed the regulator's largest fine ever after finding the company accessed user media without consent.
The Italian data privacy authority, Garante, fined Meta 805 million euros ($887m) on Saturday for accessing photos and videos on users' smartphones without specific consent, according to Al Jazeera.
The regulator stated that the Facebook app on Android devices accessed media and associated metadata on Italian users' phones without informing them. This issue involves the “Get suggestions from gallery when browsing Facebook” feature.
Garante said the feature was enabled by default and that the consent process was too generic for users to understand the permissions they were granting. The authority noted that roughly 20 million Italian Android users could have been affected.
The regulator highlighted a lack of cooperation from Meta and mentioned that a previous violation resulting in a 2019 fine contributed to the decision. The fine is the largest ever imposed by the Italian regulator.
The proceedings did not cover whether content was used to train artificial intelligence, a claim Meta denies. Meta has not yet issued a public comment and maintains the right to appeal the decision.