Instagram fined €405M for violating kids’ privacy

Dublin: Meta-owned Instagram has been fined €405m (£349m) by the Irish data watchdog for violating children's privacy. 

As per details, Data Protection Commission (DPC) has fined Instagram €405m for letting teenagers set up accounts that publicly displayed their phone numbers and email addresses. 

The DPC also found the platform had operated a user registration system whereby the accounts of 13-to-17-year-old users were set to “public” by default.

The Irish watchdog launched an investigation in late 2020 into concerns about how the image-sharing social media platform handles children’s personal data. 

"We adopted our final decision last Friday and it does contain a fine of €405m [£349m]," DPC said.

The probe centered on the “appropriateness” of Instagram profile and account settings for children, and the firm’s “responsibility to protect the data protection rights of children as vulnerable persons”. 

It was conducted under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) — the EU charter of data rights which came into effect in May 2018.

The GDPR gives data regulators the power to impose stiff fines for breaches.

Instagram's owner, Meta, said it planned to appeal against the decision. It is the third fine handed to the company by the regulator.

In the meantime, the company disagreed with how the fine was calculated and plans to appeal, adding that the inquiry “focused on old settings that we updated over a year ago”. 

Meta, which also owns Facebook, was in March slapped with a 17-million-euro fine for 12 data breaches.