An Irish regulator that helps oversee European Union data privacy has announced it has fined Facebook owner Meta €251 million over a data protection failure that led to the hacking of 29 million Facebook accounts.
The Data Protection Commission criticized Meta for a security flaw in its video upload function that hackers were able to exploit to gain full access to other users’ Facebook profiles.
Over a two-week period in 2018, unauthorized users were able to hack approximately 29 million Facebook accounts worldwide.
The personal data affected included email addresses, telephone numbers, locations and workplaces.
“The absence of data protection requirements throughout the design and development cycle may expose individuals to very serious risks and harms, including a risk to individuals’ fundamental rights and freedoms,” said Graham Doyle, the regulator’s head of communications.
“By allowing unauthorized exposure of profile information, the vulnerabilities that led to this breach created a serious risk of misuse of these types of data,” he added.
It is the latest in a series of fines levied against the US social media giant and its rivals as global regulators crack down on tech companies.
In September, the DPC fined Meta €91 million for failing to implement measures to protect users’ password data and for taking too long to alert the regulator to the problem. .
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