TikTok fined €530 million for sending EU user data to China
Ireland's data protection watchdog has fined the Chinese video sharing app TikTok 530 million euros, it announced in a press release on Friday. TikTok was found guilty of illegally sending personal data to China and not being transparent enough with its users about the process.
The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) is responsible for investigating TikTok's compliance with European data protection rules. The watchdog found that the app broke the rules when it transferred European users' personal data to China.
TikTok employees in China were given remote access to European users' data. According to the DPC, this was done without TikTok being able to prove that the data was protected in the same way as in the EU.
In addition, TikTok initially told the DPC that no European personal data was stored on servers in China. However, last month the company told the Irish regulator that it had discovered in February that this was happening to a limited extent. According to the company, the data has since been deleted.
Lack of transparency
TikTok was also fined for a lack of transparency in its privacy policy by failing to inform users that their data would be transferred to China between 2020 and 2022. The DPC added that the Chinese company has since made its privacy policy "compliant".
TikTok was fined a total of 530 million euros: 485 million for the data transfers and a further 45 million for the lack of transparency in its privacy policy. The company has six months to either comply with EU data protection rules or cease data transfers to China altogether.
TikTok has already said it will appeal the fine. In a written statement, Christine Grahn, head of EU public policy and government relations, said that TikTok "has never received a request for European user data from the Chinese authorities and has never provided European user data to them".
© BELGA PHOTO JASPER JACOBS
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