Meta Faces $402 Million USD Fine Over Instagram's Privacy Settings for Minors

Mark Zuckerberg‘s Meta is now being fined €405 million EUR (approximately $402 million USD) by the Irish Data Protection Commission over its privacy settings for minors on Instagram. The policy from the social media platform constituted a violation of Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation, and the resulting fine is the second-largest to ever come out of the European organization. It’s also the largest fine that Meta has received from a regulator, trumping the other two it has already suffered.

As for the specifics, a spokesperson from the DPC explained that the violations come from the privacy settings running specifically for children and teenagers. According to its investigation, the users’ email addresses and phone numbers were publicly displayed, and the Instagram policy makes all new accounts public by default, including those of minors.

In response, Meta issued the following statement:

“This inquiry focused on old settings that we updated over a year ago, and we’ve since released many new features to help keep teens safe and their information private. Anyone under 18 automatically has their account set to private when they join Instagram, so only people they know can see what they post, and adults can’t message teens who don’t follow them. We engaged fully with the DPC throughout their inquiry, and we’re carefully reviewing their final decision.”

Elsewhere in the tech industry, Twitter tried to create a clone of OnlyFans just earlier this year but plans fell through after noting its inability to moderate child pornography.