Privacy Blog

The Advocate General’s Opinion C-252/21 | Meta Platforms and Others (General terms of use of a social network)

The Advocate General’s Opinion C-252/21 | Meta Platforms and Others (General terms of use of a social network) was published on 20 September 2022.

The German Federal Competition Authority found that the investigation into data processing in violation of the General Data Protection Regulation (‘GDPR’) constitutes an abuse of Meta Platforms' dominant position in the social networking market for private users in Germany. The Authority prohibited Meta Platforms from processing data in accordance with Facebook's terms of service and enforcing these terms and has taken measures to prevent this.

Meta Platforms appealed to the Higher Regional Court of Düsseldorf against this decision. The meta-platform appealed to the Court of Justice to ask whether the national competition authorities were authorized to assess the compliance of the data processing with the GDPR.

According to the Advocate General’s Opinion, the important points are as follows:

  • A competition authority may consider the compliance of commercial practice with the GDPR when exercising its powers. In light of all the circumstances of the case, the Advocate General emphasizes that the compliance of this behavior with the provisions of the GDPR can be an important indicator of whether this behavior constitutes a violation of competition rules.
  • The Advocate General points out that the competition authority should take into account any decision or investigation by the competent supervisory authority, report any relevant details to it, and consult it, where appropriate.
  • The fact that an undertaking operating a social network has a dominant position in the national market for private users does not question the validity of this network user's consent to the processing of their personal data.
  • The Advocate General emphasizes that in order for the exemption from this prohibition regarding data openly disclosed to the public to be enforced, the user must be fully aware that by an explicit action he has made personal data publicly available.
  • Behaviors consisting of visiting websites and clicking buttons integrated into them cannot be considered as behavior that makes the user's sensitive personal data openly public.

You can find the full text of the Opinion here.

Kind regards,

Zumbul Attorneys at Law

info@zumbul.av.tr