EU Demands Facebook Update 'Misleading' Fine Print
20 Setembro 2018 - 07:46AM
Dow Jones News
By Valentina Pop and Sam Schechner
The European Union is ramping up pressure on Facebook Inc. to
better spell out to consumers how their data is being used or face
sanctions in several countries.
V ra Jourová, the European Commissioner for Justice, Consumers
and Gender Equality, on Thursday warned the U.S. tech firm that if
it doesn't change its "misleading terms of service" by the end of
the year, that she will call on consumer-protection authorities in
EU countries to impose sanctions.
"I am becoming rather impatient. We have been in dialogue with
Facebook almost two years," Ms. Jourová said at a press conference.
"I want to see not progress -- that is not enough for me. I want to
see results."
A spokesman for Facebook said it has made changes to its terms
based on regulators. The company "will continue our close
cooperation to understand any further concerns and make appropriate
updates," he said.
At issue for Ms. Jourová was the clarity of Facebook's terms of
service. The company updated them in the spring, but Ms. Jourova
said they remain insufficiently explicit about how the company
monetizes users' data. A spokeswoman for the EU's executive arm
said that directing users via hyperlinks to Facebook's "data
policy," which gives some more detail on ad targeting, isn't enough
for consumers.
"I expect Facebook to be honest with those that go and try to
understand" its terms and conditions, Ms. Jourová said.
The sharply worded salvo comes on top of a series of legislative
proposals and regulatory actions from Europe aimed at reining in
the power and perceived excesses of a cadre of big tech companies.
The EU in May implemented a sweeping new privacy law, GDPR, and its
parliament recently approved a draft copyright bill aimed at making
Silicon Valley companies pay more money to support music firms and
news publishers.
The EU's executive arm has also issued fines for alleged
anticompetitive conduct by Alphabet Inc.'s Google, and ordered EU
countries to recoup allegedly unpaid taxes from Apple Inc. and
Amazon.com Inc. On Wednesday, antitrust officials disclosed a new
preliminary probe into Amazon's treatment of third party
sellers.
The issue raised Thursday is legally separate from complaints
lodged against Facebook by activists under the EU's strict privacy
law, GDPR, which is enforced by a separate set of national privacy
regulators. But the two issues aren't entirely unrelated.
Some EU privacy regulators, including Ireland's Data Protection
Commissioner, which is Facebook's lead regulator in the bloc, are
looking into complaints that Facebook requires users to agree to
its terms of service to use the social network. Privacy activists
argue that users aren't freely giving their consent to the terms.
But Facebook counters that data it collects is necessary to fulfill
its contract with users to provide "a personalized experience" --
and contractual necessity is also a permitted justification under
GDPR. Naturally, any changes to Facebook's contractual terms could
affect the arguments on both sides
In contrast to Facebook, Ms. Jourova on Thursday praised another
U.S. platform, the home-rental site Airbnb Inc., for committing to
change its terms and conditions after a demand earlier this year.
The EU, in coordination with national consumer-protection
authorities, had asked Airbnb for instance improve the presentation
of its prices.
"I welcome Airbnb's willingness to do the necessary changes to
ensure full transparency and understanding of what consumers pay
for," she said.
An Airbnb spokesman didn't immediately respond to a request for
comment.
Write to Valentina Pop at valentina.pop@wsj.com and Sam
Schechner at sam.schechner@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
September 20, 2018 06:31 ET (10:31 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2018 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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