Italy Fines Meta 805 Million Euros Over Android Photos
Italy's data protection authority has fined Meta 805 million euros, or about 887 million US dollars, after finding that the company accessed Android users' photographs and videos without their consent and without telling them, the regulator said in a statement.
The agency said the access came through a Facebook feature that suggested content from a person's own gallery for them to post, and that around 20 million Android users in Italy were affected.
And the decision sets a deadline as well as a penalty, requiring Meta to turn the feature off by default within 60 days and to ask for consent separately.
The sum is equivalent to about 0.47 per cent of the group's global revenue, the authority said. It published no further breakdown of how the figure was reached beyond that revenue share.
Meta will fight it. A spokesperson said the company would appeal, strongly disagreed with the decision and called the fine disproportionate, describing the feature as a simple tool that helps people share photos and videos on Facebook, with permission granted on the device before it operates and changeable at any time in settings. The company did not say when it would file the appeal or which court would hear it.
But the authority's finding goes to the gallery itself, that Meta reached the photographs and videos without obtaining consent and without informing the people whose files they were, which is the breach the penalty is built on. Meta's own account, that permission is granted on the device, does not address whether users were told how the gallery was being used.
The investigation began last year and did not cover the possible use of that content to train artificial intelligence models, a practice Meta denies, the authority said.
It added that it has kept the right to assess separately a newer feature, launched this year, that allows content from a person's gallery to be processed in the cloud, and it set no timetable for that review.
So Meta has two months to change the default, an 805 million euro bill waiting on the appeal, and a second and newer gallery feature already marked for review.
The fine is 805 million euros, about 887 million US dollars
Italy's authority says around 20 million Android users there were affected
Meta has 60 days to disable the feature by default and seek consent
The company will appeal and calls the penalty disproportionate
The regulator has kept the right to review a newer cloud processing feature
Source: Reuters
