Amazon Dodges $844K Daily Fine for EU Data Privacy Violations—For Now

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Amazon Privacy Violations Overview:

• Who: The Luxembourg administrative tribunal reversed an order handed down by the European Union’s privacy enforcement agency that would have required Amazon to pay about $844,00 per day if it didn’t adjust its privacy policies.
• Why: The president of the tribunal said the directives for Amazon to change its privacy policies weren’t clear enough.
• Where: Regulators in Luxembourg, where Amazon’s European headquarters is located, issued the original fine.

Amazon has escaped an order to pay daily fines of about $844,000 as part of a record €746 million penalty handed down to it in July over data privacy violations.

On Dec. 17, a judge of the Luxembourg administrative tribunal suspended orders that would have forced the retail giant to pay 0.1% of the total amount of the fine per day starting Jan. 15 if it hadn’t made significant changes to its data processes by then, Bloomberg reports. 

The order, made by the European Union’s privacy enforcement agency, wasn’t “sufficiently clear, precise and without uncertainty” to allow Amazon to meet the requirements in time, the tribunal said in a statement.

At a hearing earlier this month, Amazon lawyer Thomas Berger said the watchdog’s deadline was “unrealistic” because it’s not clear what changes are required. 

“We have no guidance about what we need to do, so how do we do it?” he said.

Fine Was Largest Issued Under EU Data Privacy Laws 

In July, Amazon was ordered to pay €746 million (about $844 million) for breaching the European Union’s data privacy laws. The fine was issued July 16 under the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and was the largest issued under the regulation in its three-year existence. 

The European Union’s privacy enforcement agency says Amazon did not comply with GDPR requirements in the way it uses customer information to serve people ads. It ordered the tech giant to change its business practices. 

The fine was issued by the GDPR regulators in Luxembourg, where Amazon has its European headquarters.

The penalty stemmed from a 2018 complaint filed by French privacy rights group La Quadrature du Net, which said the GDPR had been violated through Amazon’s practice of using consumer data for behavioral analysis and targeted advertising. Amazon is appealing the fine. 

Meanwhile, privacy experts said in July that the Amazon penalty marked the latest development in how the EU is “leading the world” on privacy and tech regulations, Law360 reported.

Ecommerce giant Amazon was founded in 1994 and has since evolved and expanded to become a mega retail corporation and the world’s largest online marketplace. 

The technology company has faced backlash from both employees and consumers with countless lawsuits and class action lawsuits resulting from a variety of allegations about its operations, including allegations of unfair pricing practices, multiple privacy violations and claims Amazon exposed workers to COVID-19.

Earlier this year, United States plaintiffs filed a class action lawsuit claiming Amazon’s Alexa device is eavesdropping on private conversations, recording and storing them on an Amazon server for the multinational company to use at its will.

What do you think of Amazon facing a fine for the way it collects data online? Let us know in the comments!

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