Google Feels the Brunt of GDPR Enforcement

Last week France opened a new chapter in data protection when its data watchdog National Commission on Informatics and Liberty (CNIL) slapped search engine giant Google with a €50 million (equivalent to US$57 million) fine on Monday for violating EU privacy law. Well, the French data protection watchdog said Google – whose 20-year success has been built on harvesting the personal data of millions to sell targeted ads – had violated EU privacy rules because it did not properly ask its users for consent on how to use their personal data with regards to personalized ads. In other words, Google is not seeking ‘unambiguous’ consent for all the various ways it processes data, but limiting the steps by pre-ticking certain boxes – in violation of the GDPR principle in which companies are required to gain the user’s “genuine consent” before collecting their information, which means making consent an explicitly opt-in process that’s easy for people to withdraw.

Source: www.saiglobal.com