Meta-owned Instagram fined $402 m over handling of teens' data
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Meta-owned photo and video-sharing platform Instagram has been fined 405 million euros ($402 million) by the Irish Data Protection Commission for violations of the General Data Protection Regulation.
The fine, the second-highest under the GDPR after a 746 million euros penalty against Amazon, is the third for a Meta-owned company handed down by the Irish regulator, reports Politico.
The Meta-owned social media platform has been found to mishandle the personal information of teenagers. Ireland's Data Protection Commission's investigation allegedly revealed that Instagram displayed the personal information of users between the age of 13 and 17 years.
The report suggested that several teenage users who switched to a business account had their contact information displayed on their profiles.
It is believed that users switched to business accounts to track the statistics of their accounts. Instagram had supposedly started removing this feature from personal accounts in several countries.
Instagram's parent Meta disagrees with the way the fine was calculated and has expressed its desire to appeal the fine.
According to Reuters, Instagram will have to pay Irish authorities a EUR 405 million fine as it was found to have violated EU data privacy rules.
Instagram has stated that the investigation made by Ireland's Data Protection Commission centered around "old settings" that were updated over a year ago, including new privacy features for teens. The Irish watchdog will reveal the complete details of this fine next week.