Irish Data Slaps TikTok with Substantial Fine Over Data Transfers to China
(MENAFN) Irish data protection authorities have levied a substantial €530 million ($601 million) fine against TikTok on Friday for violating European privacy regulations. This penalty ranks among the largest issued under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to date.
The decision by Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) concludes an extensive inquiry that revealed the Chinese-owned social media platform breached GDPR by transferring European users' personal data to China, where it was accessible to engineers.
This penalty is the third-largest ever imposed by the DPC, following fines of €746 million against Amazon and a record €1.2 billion against Facebook's parent company, Meta Platforms.
The DPC determined that TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, did not implement sufficient safeguards regarding the access of personal data from users within the European Economic Area (EEA) by staff located overseas.
“TikTok’s personal data transfers to China infringed the GDPR because TikTok failed to verify, guarantee, and demonstrate that the personal data of EEA (European Economic Area) users, remotely accessed by staff in China, was afforded a level of protection essentially equivalent to that guaranteed within the EU,” stated DPC Deputy Commissioner Graham Doyle.
He further explained, “As a result of TikTok’s failure to undertake the necessary assessments, TikTok did not address potential access by Chinese authorities to EEA personal data under Chinese anti-terrorism, counter-espionage, and other laws identified by TikTok as materially diverging from EU standards.”
TikTok has announced its intention to appeal the ruling and cautioned that the decision could have broad implications for other international companies involved in cross-border data transfers.
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