The court fined the European Commission for violating its own law

The European Court of General Court, the EU’s highest court, ruled on Wednesday that the European Commission must pay €400 in damages to a German national for violating its own data protection rules.

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The EU’s highest court said in a statement that the European Commission violated a citizen’s rights by transferring some of his personal data to the United States without proper guarantees.

A German citizen was reported to have used the “Login with Facebook✴” option on the event website when registering for a conference organized by the European Commission. However, he stated that information about his IP address, browser and device was transferred to companies in the United States, namely Amazon, which hosts the conference website, and Meta✴, which owns Facebook✴, which, according to the citizen, is a violation of his rights under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The European Commission committed a “sufficiently serious breach” of the rules, which cover 27 European countries, the European Court of General Jurisdiction said. Reuters, which reported the incident, noted that this is the first time the European Commission has been fined.