By CCN.com: French regulators have slapped Google with a landmark $57 million fine for committing GDPR infractions, making it the first major U.S. tech company to face punitive action under Europe’s new digital privacy regime.

France Fines Google $57 Million for GDPR Infractions

The French Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL) imposed the fine of 50 million euros (roughly $57 million) on Google following the results of an inquiry into GDPR compliance complaints put forward by French privacy rights organisations None Of Your Business and La Quadrature du Net.

According to CNIL, Google failed to satisfactorily inform users about how their data is collected and used in serving advertisements and marketing messages. The agency also stated that Google failed to properly obtain user consent for the purpose of using their data to serve them personalised ads.

Confirming the fine, an official statement released on CNIL’s website said:

On 21 January 2019, the CNIL’s restricted committee imposed a financial penalty of 50 Million euros against the company GOOGLE LLC, in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), for lack of transparency, inadequate information and lack of valid consent regarding ads personalization.

With the fine, Google becomes the first major U.S. tech company to be punished for falling afoul of GDPR regulations since the EU brought the privacy-focused rules into effect in 2018.

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