Photo: ANP
Online retailer Amazon has been fined 746 million euros by Luxembourg’s privacy watchdog CNPD. This is the largest privacy fine ever imposed in the European Union. Amazon allegedly violated strict data protection rules when collecting and using personal data. It’s unclear what exactly Amazon did wrong.
Amazon is headquartered in Luxembourg in the European Union and is therefore primarily subject to the Luxembourg regulatory body CNPD. The case in question has been going on since 2019, when the French privacy rights organization filed a complaint.
“This fine is a disheartening first step, but we must remain vigilant. We have to wait and see if the decision also includes an order to correct the behaviour,” Bastien Le Querec said on behalf of the French privacy rights group La Quadrature du Net. The group itself has not received the decision. .
It was recently reported that the American company is facing a heavy fine. The fine was decided on July 16, but Amazon is only publishing it now. The company says the allegations are unfounded. “There was no data breach and customer data was not provided to third parties,” the company said. So Amazon plans to appeal.
Amazon says it collects data to improve customer experience. I have established guidelines about what employees can do with this data. Some lawmakers and regulators believe that Amazon is also giving itself an unfair advantage in the marketplace with its information collected on customers. The European Union and the United Kingdom, among other countries, are conducting research on this.
