A new complaint has been filed against X, asserting that its ad targeting violated the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This high-impact EU data privacy regulation can lead to fines of up to 4% of global yearly profits. The grievance, filed on Thursday by Max Schrems' action group Noyb with the Dutch data privacy body, charges that X utilized people's political leanings and religious convictions to target them with ads in an illegal manner. Schrems is an eminent figure in EU privacy activities, and was triumphant in a legal conflict with Meta parent company Facebook, ending the business's use of a contentious data-transferring protocol to send Europeans' information to the U.S.
Max Schrems, a privacy activist, has lodged a complaint with the Dutch data protection authority against Elon Musk's X platform. The complaint claims that X violated European Union's stringent privacy regulations by targeting people on the basis of their political views and religious beliefs with ads. For example, Schrems says that he was shown an advertisement from the European Commission which focused on tackling child sexual abuse and the grooming of children online, and that this ad was specifically targeted at users from the Netherlands and excluded 44 "targeting segments," such as certain political parties and far-right politicians. Furthermore, it allegedly did not target people based on their Euroscepticism or nationalist political views. The complaints assertions come from X's own ads repository.
When contacted by CNBC, X was not immediately available for comment. In response to a CNBC email, the Commission indicated that it had become aware of the campaign and was conducting a "thorough review." The Commission also noted that it had internally provided ongoing guidance to guarantee social media managers and external contractors were familiar with the rules. Furthermore, due to the disturbing rise in disinformation and hate speech on social media platforms in recent weeks, back in October the Commission recommended that services refrain from advertising on X. The Commission added that, in keeping with the Digital Services Act, a significant content regulation law in the EU, platforms like X must not display targeted ads based on a user's sensitive data. The complaint highlights that X is able to collect a user's clicks and replies to adjust content for them; a practice known as "microtargeting." Microtargeting was utilized by Cambridge Analytica during the 2016 presidential election and helped Donald Trump gain the vote by a very small margin.
Max Schrems, a prominent European privacy activist, recently challenged Facebook's parent company, Meta, over their use of the EU-U.S. safe harbor data-sharing system to transfer Europeans' personal information to the States. His complaint is currently being reviewed by the Dutch data protection agency. Since Meta's main headquarters in Europe are based in Ireland, it is the Dublin regulator that is responsible for supervising the platform's activity with respect to European privacy law. Schrems took the initiative of filing his complaint in the Netherlands, since he holds Dutch citizenship. Investigation of the complaint may lead to probes under the EU General Data Protection Regulation, capable of inflicting companies with a fine of up to 4% of their global annual revenues if GDPR is breached. Meta has recently come under fire following the controvery brought about by Elon Musk's comments on the platform, prompting companies such as Apple, Disney and Microsoft to remove their ads.
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