Google has received a fine of 50 million euros (56.5 million USD) for privacy and transparency violations of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
The French data protection authority CNIL issued the fine in response to complaints that Google was illegally processing consumer data, was misleading about the use of consumer data, and unclear about how long the data is stored on their servers. The complaint also accuses Google of forcing users to consent to the terms and conditions of the service in words that an average user could find extremely difficult to understand.
In the U.S., Facebook could face fines imposed by the FTC for potentially violating privacy agreements that were agreed upon in a consent decree. If convicted, it will be the first major punishment Facebook has faced in the U.S.