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Updated, 17.35
IRELAND’S DATA PROTECTION COMMISSIONER (DPC) will be asked to investigate the legality of Facebook’s ‘Like’ button in the coming days, after an equivalent German official deemed the feature to be in breach of EU law.
TheJournal.ie has learned that the DPC will shortly receive an official complaint about the button from an Austrian-based lobby group, which has already filed 16 other complaints relating to Facebook’s data handling and privacy settings in the last few days.
If the complaint is successful, Facebook may be forced to adopt radical changes in the way it operates the ubiquitous ‘Like’ feature – or potentially face court action demanding that the feature be disabled for hundreds of millions of worldwide users.
A spokesman for the lobby group, ‘Europe v Facebook‘, said that complaints about the legality of the ‘Like’ button had not specifically been included in its first batch of complaints, filed last week, but that a follow-up complaint dealing specifically with the feature would be lodged in the coming days.
The office of Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner, Billy Hawkes, will then examine whether the technology behind the button constitutes a breach of privacy law in this country.
Although the group behind the complaints is based in Austria, the complaints are being filed with the Irish DPC because Facebook’s Terms of Use declares users outside the US and Canada to be in a contract with Facebook Ireland Ltd, the company’s Dublin operation which acts as its headquarters for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
Last week the data protection commissioner in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, Thilo Weichert, deemed that the ‘Like’ button was a breach of local, federal and EU law – and said institutions in his state would receive heavy fines if they did not remove the trademark ‘thumbs-up’ button from their sites.
The incoming complaint focuses on how the ‘Like’ button allows Facebook to track the online activity of any web user – even those who are not among the social networking site’s 750 million members worldwide.
By logging the IP addresses of internet users when they visit pages containing an embedded ‘Like’ button, the social network is theoretically able to build a profile of that user’s browsing habits, and then use this to its commercial advantage.
This was illegal under EU law, Weichert argued, because Facebook would harvest this data through web servers based in the US – and not within the EU, as the commissioner said was required.
While Weichert claimed that users could expect their browsing history to be kept on record for around two years, Facebook in response said it deleted such data after 90 days.
A spokesperson for the DPC here told TheJournal.ie that while its office had noted the German decision, it had not yet begun an investigation into whether the ‘Like’ button complied with data protection laws effective in Ireland.
The spokesperson did confirm, however, that the office would examine “different aspects of Facebook Ireland’s compliance with Irish data protection law” in light of any complaints received from the Austrian group.
Among complaints already received are allegations that Facebook retains data – such as status updates, chat messages, photo tags, deleted friendships and ‘pokes’ – even after the user removes them from their own personal profile.
Other complaints filed by the Austrian group include Facebook’s ability to build ‘shadow profiles’ of non-users by harvesting data supplied by other users – such as phonebook databases.
The group also argues that material posted by users on others’ pages can be shared in ways not known to them, and that third-party applications installed by a user’s ‘friends’ can access their own personal data – with no guarantee of privacy standards.
A Facebook spokesperson said the company was aware of the complaints being filed by the Austrian group.
“The Irish Data Protection Commission has well-established procedures for resolving such issues through dialogue with the relevant data controller which we expect to follow in this case,” the spokesperson said.
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That might work if they updated itself. 8 hours on Friday with no updates other thant flight was taking off ten minutes ago
@Sean Partidge: airlines update that side
@Sean Partidge: Not the airport’s responsibility.
I suppose this is the DAA’s fault too.
Stuck in Stansted. 9.50 Flight to Dublin cancelled at 11.30 last night with no notification untill I went online to look. No flights until tomorrow & have to get to Gatwick. It’s absolutely crazy here.
@John Barry: Hope you all get in the air soon. If only there were regular updates and places to charge your phones, it would be less stressful all right.
(Put on a mask though, I’ve two friends down with Covid after a return flight where no one bothered.)
Cancelled flights? Luxury!
In my day we had to walk through airport – none a this cosy security checks. All and sundry (middle class if ya don’t mind) dressed resplendently singin’ tut rain in Spain, as such. Young generation xyz etc don’t know their livin’ what with over bookins, plane rage, terror-types and Ryanairs most bew-tee-full colour co-ordination and oppulant seating.
Cancelled flights? They’re lucky! We used to dreeem a been cancelled.
Out via Dublin Airport recently. Dirty and filthy. Everywhere from the road to the aircraft. Retail staff just don’t even know what country they’re in.
millions of others go through this.
Almost 3 hours waiting on a stand, after a 9 hour flight. Watching winter operations training outside the aircraft while families onboard contacted loved ones to say We’re parked on the new runway to allow other airlines taxi into non contact stands.
Plenty of stands vacant and not in use.
I simply hate having to fly anywhere but jaysus, can the Airport operator not get anything right.
@Liam McGrath: bit of a skewed viewpoint
@Ciaran: correct, out was bad, inbound was worse.
God love anyone travelling via Dublin.
Going to Dublin airport these days is a bit like your prepay meter. A load of ball ox.
Dubliners say they’re more than welcome to our share of the freezing fog, we’ve had enough of it on the east coast!
have your say