Fined over 200 million! Amazon has suffered a series of setbacks recently

According to foreign media reports, on June 29, the French data protection agency, the National Commission for Information Technology and Freedoms (hereinafter referred to as "CNIL"), announced that with the confirmation of the Council of State , the one and a half-year-long case of Amazon violating user privacy has officially ended, and Amazon must pay a fine of 35 million euros ( about 245 million yuan ) .

This case occurred in December 2020. CNIL accused Amazon Europe Core of leaking user data and violating user privacy, violating two relevant EU laws and regulations .

First, the CNIL pointed out that when users visit the "Amazon.fr" website, a large number of cookies for advertising purposes ( understood as: web browsing history saved by the system ) are automatically placed on the website without informing the user in advance . Since such cookies are not essential to the service, the CNIL believes that the company has not fulfilled its obligation to obtain the consent of Internet users before placing cookies.

In addition , CNIL believes that although there is a pop-up prompt for saving cookies on the "Amazon.fr" website , the pop-up option on the website does not allow users to clearly understand the storage of cookies, resulting in users being unable to understand the true purpose of these cookies and thus unable to refuse.

The CNIL also pointed out that when a user visits the “Amazon.fr” website by clicking on an advertisement posted on another website , the same cookies are also stored without any warning.

For European and American countries that value privacy, Amazon's behavior is undoubtedly "playing on a minefield." Based on this, CNIL announced a fine of 35 million euros on Amazon .

However, the CNIL 's penalty decision has not been implemented because it has not been supported by the French Supreme Court. It was not until January 28 this year that the French Supreme Court responded to the accusation , and then the case was sent to the French Council of State. On June 27 , the French Council of State officially announced that it had approved the accusation .

( Legal document punishing Amazon )

It is understood that in December 2020 , CNIL not only announced a fine of 35 million euros ( about 245 million yuan ) on Amazon , but also fined Google 100 million euros ( about 700 million yuan ) for data leaks . The Council of State stated that CNIL has the power to sanction violations of the Data Protection Act, even if the data controller is not established in France but conducts related activities in France .

The French Council of State believes that Amazon has violated Article 82 of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) , namely, storing cookies without consent and not informing users . Therefore, it agreed with the CNIL's ruling and fined Amazon 35 million euros.

The French Council of State also said that the 35 million euro fine was not excessive for Amazon in terms of the seriousness of the violations, the scope of the treatment and the company's financial capabilities .

Amazon has been in trouble recently. Just a week ago, 57 million products were seized by Brazil, and now it is facing a huge fine. It can be said that "it rains but it leaks."

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