Google has been slapped with a fine of US$57M by French authorities – the first penalty for a U.S. tech giant under new European data privacy rules (GDPR) that took effect last year.
The National Data Protection Commission said Google “lack[ed] transparency, inadequate information and lack[ed] valid consent” regarding ad personalisation for users.
Google must be providing personal information to advertisers without the express consent which is required under the GDPR. Whilst Google states it is looking at it’s “next steps” it will be interesting to see how it modifies its services or its consents to see how it is going to meet its obligations of transparency. How transparent will the notifications become?
It is interesting that the fine was in respect of ad personalisation and not Google lacking transparency regarding its continued monitoring of users despite users expressly turn off monitoring.