The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) in Dublin has sanctioned LinkedIn. The business social media platform will be fined 310 million euros for unlawfully using personal data to display targeted ads. LinkedIn must also amend its data processing to comply with European privacy laws.
LinkedIn violated the GDPR in several ways. The consent the platform sought from users was not freely given; users were not given specific enough or sufficient information. LinkedIn also improperly invoked "legitimate interests" for processing personal data to show the targeted ads.
Further, LinkedIn incorrectly argued that the processing of personal data was necessary to perform the agreement. Moreover, the processing of personal data was not fair and transparent.
"The lawfulness of data processing is a fundamental part of data protection law and processing personal data without an appropriate legal basis is a clear and serious violation of the fundamental right to data protection," the DPC stated.
