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Meta Fined €251 Million by Ireland for 2018 Facebook Data Breach Affecting 29 Million Users

Dec 17, 2024, 04:16 PM

Meta Platforms Inc. has been fined €251 million by Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) for a significant data breach that occurred in 2018, affecting approximately 29 million Facebook users globally, including about 3 million in the European Union and European Economic Area. The breach was caused by a vulnerability in the 'View As' feature of Facebook, which hackers exploited to access sensitive personal data such as users' full names, contact details, location, place of work, date of birth, religion, gender, and children's personal data. The DPC highlighted that Meta failed to incorporate data protection requirements in the design and development of its systems, leading to the unauthorized exposure of profile information and posing a serious risk of data misuse. Meta took immediate action to fix the issue upon discovery and plans to appeal the decision.