Fine imposed by France on Google and Amazon of €135 million

Fine imposed by France on Google and Amazon of €135 million

France's Data privacy watchdog CNIL has imposed a hefty fine on Google and Amazon for €100 million and €35 million respectively

A heavy fine to the tune of €135 million was imposed on the two units of Google and a single unit of Amazon subsidiary, over advertising cookies. CNIL (The Commission Nationale de L'informatiqueet des Libertés) regulator said that fines were imposes 'for having placed advertising cookies on the computers of users, without obtaining prior consent and without providing adequate information'.

The cookie is a small piece of data that is stored on the user's computer browser which permits the websites for identifying the users and stores their previous activities on the browser. Accordingly, the cookies flash on the browsed screen of the user.

The Regulator of CNIL said that whenever a user visited the webpage on Google the cookies are used for advertisements that appear automatically on the screen of the computer without any activity of the user. A similar issue arose with the Amazon website.

CNIL further stated that such a cookie "Can only be placed after the user has expressed his or her consent and thus violated regulations on receiving prior consent".

Google was fined as it did not sufficiently prevent the privacy breach of information of the users as the users were unaware of the cookies that had been placed on their computer's screen. It failed to provide any sufficient reason for the use of cookies on the website.

Amazon was fined as it did not provide clear information and details related to the cookies that were placed on the computer screens of the users until it was redesigned in September 2020.

CNIL regulator said, "No matter what path the users used to visit the website, they were either insufficiently informed or never informed of the fact that cookies were placed on their computer."

CNIL regulatory body slapped a fine of €35 million on Amazon subsidiary and €60 million fine on Google LLC and €40 million fine on Google Ireland Limited. It stated that reflecting cookies without the user's permission is a violation of the rules and regulations of the website.