Select Language:
Austria’s Supreme Court instructed Meta on Thursday to grant an online privacy advocate access to all his personal data within two weeks, ending an 11-year legal dispute. The court emphasized that personalized ads and data usage without user consent are prohibited. Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, must disclose all processed personal data within one month, including sources, recipients, and processing reasons, without withholding any information.
Max Schrems, an Austrian activist and lawyer advocating for online privacy, sued Meta in 2014, three years after he initially sought complete access to his data. Meta only provided partial data, leading Schrems to challenge the company’s refusal to share everything. The non-profit organization noyb, based in Vienna and dedicated to enforcing data privacy laws, stated that all of Meta’s claims about trade secrets or data restrictions were dismissed, allowing unprecedented insight into Meta’s data operations.
This case has been brought before Austria’s highest court three times and twice at the European Court of Justice. The final ruling will enable Schrems to access Meta’s data practices concerning his user information, applicable to anyone else’s data as well. Schrems received 500 euros ($585) in damages. Although a final decision on legal costs is pending, total litigation expenses have surpassed 200,000 euros. His lawyer, Katharina Raabe-Stuppnig, remarked that Austrian case law suggests similar claims could result in comparable awards in the future.
ChatGPT
Perplexity
Gemini AI
Grok AI
