Advocate General (AG) Athanasios Rantos of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) recently took the view that Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, misused personal user data to target ads, according to his opinion. The case pertained to an Austrian privacy lawyer, Max Schrems, who initiated legal action against Meta in 2020, claiming the company violated the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) through its use of his personal data.
In a bid for further clarity on the GDPR’s data minimization principle, the Supreme Court of Austria forwarded the case to the CJEU in 2021. The core question before the court was whether the data minimization principle allows a data controller to freely process personal data, both in terms of the volume or type of data and the duration of its processing.
Rantos took the position in his opinion that the GDPR does not permit unlimited processing of personal data for targeted advertising purposes. He also argued that a person’s public declarations about their sexual orientation don’t automatically allow for that information, or other data related to their sexual orientation, to be used for personalized advertising.
Although the AG’s opinion isn’t legally binding, CJEU judges often heed their perspectives. Despite this, Meta maintains that it is dedicated to privacy protection – having invested $5.5 billion in its privacy program since 2019 and having voluntarily reduced the amount of user data it collects.
For more context and detailed updates on this case, visit JURIST.