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LinkedIn fined € 310M for processing personal data without appropriate legal basis


LinkedIn not only gets a slap on the wrist for processing personal data without the correct legal basis. The social network for businesses also has to cough up € 310 million in administrative fines and bring its processing into compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The Data Protection Commission (DPC) launched an inquiry into LinkedIn’s practices of processing of personal data for behavior analysis and targeted advertising after the French data protection authority (DPA) filed the initial complaint.

As the GDPR dictates, the conclusions of the investigation were shared with other member states of the EU. No objections to the DPC’s draft decision were raised. On October 22, the DPC adopted its final decision and handed its conclusions over to LinkedIn.

The Irish privacy regulator voiced its concerns over the lawfulness, fairness and transparency of the processing of personal data of LinkedIn users.

First of all, the consent the company asked users for the processing of their data was not freely given, sufficiently informed, or unambiguous, as is required by the GDPR.

In addition, LinkedIn wrongly relied on ‘legitimate interests’ for processing personal data for behavioral analysis, third party analytics, and in order to show personalized ads.

Lastly, LinkedIn falsely argued that the processing of personal data was a ‘contractual necessity’ for behavioral analysis and targeted advertising.

“The lawfulness of processing is a fundamental aspect of data protection law and the processing of personal data without an appropriate legal basis is a clear and serious violation of a data subjects’ fundamental right to data protection,” Graham Doyle, Deputy Commissioner at the DPC, says in a statement.

For these violations of the GDPR, LinkedIn receives a reprimand from the DPC.

Secondly, the Irish data protection authority imposes three administrative fines for a total of € 310 million.

And finally, the DPC has issued an order for LinkedIn to bring its data processing practices into compliance with the GDPR.

“While we believe we have been in compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), we are working to ensure our ad practices meet this decision by the IDPC’s deadline,” LinkedIn says in a statement to press agency Reuters.


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