Students To Sue Facebook Over Data Protection
Bangalore: A group of Austrian students campaigning for online privacy is suing Facebook over its data protection policy, reports International Business Times.
The group named europe v facebook is campaigning to change data protection laws in Ireland which houses the Facebook’s European headquarters.
The group had success with its campaign to have Facebook’s facial recognition technology to be barred in the Europe, and it now feels that the Irish Data Protection Commissioner has "failed to investigate" many issues with Facebook's privacy policy. "The Irish authority is miles away from other European data protection authorities in its understanding of the law, and failed to investigate many things," the group said on its website. "We are hoping for a legally compliant solution from the Irish data protection authority. Unfortunately, that is highly doubtful at the moment. Therefore we are also preparing ourselves for a lawsuit in Ireland."
Read: 10 Most Ridiculous Technology Lawsuits Ever
The group has published a 73-page document detailing its complaints against Facebook, citing issues with the Tagging, Groups and "Like" systems, "When FB-I (Facebook Incorporated) says that by signing up to Facebook.com data subjects have allowed it to track users anywhere on the web, no matter of the content, time and purpose, FB-I ignores that consent must be informed and specific," explains the document. "This is not the case and there is currently no counterargument by FB-I."
Facebook in recent times had come under sever scrutiny over its data usage practices when it came to light that the company working with Datalogix to match Facebook accounts to department store loyalty cards.
Facebook is also facing a class-action lawsuit in the US, for violating privacy rights by publicizing users' "Likes" without their consent. US District Judge Richard Seeborg has preliminarily approved that each of the users who had their "Likes" published be paid $10 from a $20 million settlement fund.
