Google Fined €403 Million by Irish Data Protection Commission Over Location Data
Data Protection Commission fines Google €403M over processing of location data
The Data Protection Commission fined Google €403 million for violating GDPR rules on location data processing in Web & App Activity, Location History, and Location Accuracy. The inquiry found breaches of lawfulness, fairness, transparency, and retention obligations. Google must comply within six months. Deputy Commissioner Graham Doyle noted that users were kept unaware their location data was used to target ads and infer interests, and that excessive retention worsened the loss of control.
As a result of Google’s failures in this regard, individuals could have been unaware that their location was being used to, for example, influence them with ads or to infer their interests, and could lose control over their personal data.
- john_strinlai
for perspective, €403M = ~30 hours of net income, or ~10 hours of revenue (based on 2025 numbers, current exchange rates).
- noworld
Do they only fine American companies in Europe?
- profsummergig
Someone recently fined Facebook $17 Billion. It was on the front page of NYT for 6 days (like as if it was a huge "get").
About 1% of FB's market cap. And their sins get washed away.
Everybody wins.
At this rate, fining tech-cos will be a major source of revenue for governments. Everybody wins.
- fintechjock
The EU seems to live in a world all on its own. They can’t fine enough to actually change the behavior of big companies, but they can fine enough to kill their own startup culture.
I don’t feel bad for them anymore. Their voters seem to be fine with this status quo. And I get why other countries see these fines as trying to raise taxes by other means because it hasn’t and won’t change anything.
- bobmarleybiceps
it's depressing how small google's / meta's fines are. should be a % of revenue or total stock valuation or something.