Inquiry concerning 12 Facebook personal data breaches

(IN 18-11-5)

Date of Decision: 15 March 2022

The DPC has adopted a decision, imposing a fine of €17 million on Meta Platforms Ireland Limited (formerly Facebook Ireland Limited) (“Meta Platforms”).

The decision followed an inquiry by the DPC into a series of 12 data breach notifications it received in the six-month period between 7 June 2018 and 4 December 2018. The inquiry examined the extent to which Meta Platforms complied with the requirements of GDPR Articles 5(1)(f), 5(2), 24(1) and 32(1) in relation to the processing of personal data relevant to the twelve breach notifications.

As a result of its inquiry, the DPC found that Meta Platforms infringed Articles 5(2) and 24(1) GDPR. The DPC found that Meta Platforms failed to have in place appropriate technical and organisational measures, which would enable it to readily demonstrate the security measures that it implemented in practice to protect EU users’ data, in the context of the twelve personal data breaches.

Given that the processing under examination constituted “cross-border” processing, the DPC’s decision was subject to the co-decision-making process outlined in Article 60 GDPR and all of the other European supervisory authorities were engaged as co-decisionmakers. While objections to the DPC’s draft decision were raised by two of the European supervisory authorities, consensus was achieved through further engagement between the DPC and the supervisory authorities concerned. Accordingly, the DPC’s decision represents the collective views of both the DPC and its counterpart supervisory authorities throughout the EU.

For more information, you can download a copy of the full decision at this link: Meta Platforms Ireland Limited (formerly known as Facebook Ireland Limited) - March 2022(PDF, 1,480 KB).