Meta, the parent company of social media giant Facebook, is expected to be handed a significant fine from the European Union due to its failure to comply with a warning over transatlantic data transfers.
The fine is related to the migration of data from Facebook’s European Union users to servers located in the United States. The amount of the penalty is anticipated to surpass the previous record fine of EUR 746 million ($821.20 million) imposed on Amazon.com Inc.
Led by Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner Helen Dixon, European Union regulators have been concluding their efforts to ban the legal mechanism employed by Facebook for transferring user data from Europe.
According to reports, this action is driven by concerns that U.S. intelligence agencies might gain access to the information. In April, it was announced that the Irish Data Protection Commissioner had a month to issue an order that would halt Facebook’s transatlantic data transfers. It is possible that the ban will be implemented by mid-May. The highest court in Europe ruled in 2020 that an agreement for data transfers between the EU and the U.S. was invalid due to apprehensions regarding surveillance.
Last year, Meta cautioned that if an order was issued to prohibit the method it uses for transferring data from Europe to the United States, it might be compelled to suspend Facebook services in Europe.
