Privacy

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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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EU tells Meta it can't paywall privacy (www.theregister.com)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

30 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The EU's Data Protection Board (EDPB) has told large online platforms they should not offer users a binary choice between paying for a service and consenting to their personal data being used to provide targeted advertising.

In October last year, the social media giant said it would be possible to pay Meta to stop Instagram or Facebook feeds of personalized ads and prevent it from using personal data for marketing for users in the EU, EEA, or Switzerland. Meta then announced a subscription model of €9.99/month on the web or €12.99/month on iOS and Android for users who did not want their personal data used for targeted advertising.

At the time, Felix Mikolasch, data protection lawyer at noyb, said: "EU law requires that consent is the genuine free will of the user. Contrary to this law, Meta charges a 'privacy fee' of up to €250 per year if anyone dares to exercise their fundamental right to data protection."

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[+] [email protected] -22 points 7 months ago (20 children)

I honestly don't understand how what Facebook is doing a bad thing. The deal has always been that targeted advertising is how you pay for a free service.

This isn't exclusive to Facebook.

Offering an ad free experience for a subscription fee is an extremely common practice. Do people really expect to be able to use an entertainment platform for free?

[–] [email protected] 14 points 7 months ago (1 children)

It's bad because the subscription fee is ridiculous high compared, and only for one reason.

And that's getting you to consent, because comprehensive data is worth more for them.

Also, the whole point is to give back users the right to their data. They don't take away Facebooks right to show ads.

Selling personal data is not equal showing ads.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I guess you didn't read the article, then. This isn't about them selling the data they gathered, only about letting you pay for an ad free experience.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 7 months ago

No this is also not correct. Paying for an ad free experience still seems to be valid.

What was ruled here is, that it is not considered a free choice to choose between paying money or paying with your data to access the service.

According to the EU law the user consents to harvest the digital data must be freely given.

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