Meta Fined 1.7 Trillion KRW for Personal Data Protection Law Violation in Ireland

"EU Court Data Transfer Agreement Invalid Ruling Yet Enforced... GDPR Violation"
Largest Scale Ever... Meta Immediately Appeals

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, was fined 1.2 billion euros (approximately 1.7 trillion KRW) in Ireland for violations of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), CNBC reported on the 22nd (local time).

According to the report, the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) imposed the fine on Meta and ordered the company to stop transferring personal data to the United States within five months.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

Meta had previously transferred personal data within and outside the European Union (EU) using a mechanism called Standard Contractual Clauses. The DPC pointed out that despite a court ruling in 2020 declaring the EU-US data transfer agreement invalid, Meta continued to transfer European citizens' personal data to the US, thereby violating the GDPR.

The 1.2 billion euro fine is the largest ever imposed for GDPR violations within the EU. Previously, Amazon was fined 746 million euros (approximately 1.06 trillion KRW) by Luxembourg in 2021.

Meta immediately announced its intention to appeal. Nick Clegg, Meta’s president, said, "We are preparing to appeal this decision," adding, "Considering the harm this order would cause, including to the millions of customers who use Facebook daily, we will promptly request the court to suspend the enforcement of this order."