TikTok Faces €530 Million Fine in Europe Over Privacy Issues

The Irish Data Privacy Commissioner (DPC) declared that TikTok is which is owned and operated by China's ByteDance it failed to prove it was a legitimate site for EU customers' private information including some that are accessible remotely by employees in China is protected by the level of security as required by EU law.

In the end the short-video platform did not consider the possibility of access to data by Chinese authorities to data in the context of counter-espionage laws and other laws deemed by TikTok as being in significant conflict with EU standards as the DPC stated in the statement.

It also noted that the choice is not a complete consideration of the security measures for data that were first implemented in 2023. They independently control remote access and ensure EU users' data is securely stored in specialized data centres located in Europe and in the United States.

TikTok is a social network that has grown quickly among teens around the globe in recent years, and currently has more than 175 million active users in Europe and the United States, said it has not received any request for EU information from Chinese authorities and has not provided any information to the Chinese authorities.

"This ruling risks setting a precedent with far-reaching consequences for companies and entire industries across Europe that operate on a global scale," TikTok stated in an announcement.

The DPC also found that even though TikTok claimed throughout the 4-year investigation that it didn't keep EU users' data on servers located in China the company revealed the month before that it found in February that a small amount of its data Protection was kept in China and was later deleted.

"The DPC is taking these recent developments very seriously. We are considering what further regulatory action may be warranted," DPC Deputy Commissioner Graham Doyle said.