The EU's top court has endorsed the powers given to national data watchdogs to pursue Big Tech companies even if they are not lead regulators in a blow to Google, Apple, Facebook and others.
EU Court of Justice. Photo: nitpicker / Shutterstock
Photo: nitpicker / Shutterstock
The ruling by the EU Court of Justice (CJEU) could lead to national watchdogs taking action against US tech companies, many of which have their European headquarters in Dublin, Ireland.
A number of national regulators across the 27 EU member states have long complained that their Irish counterpart takes too long to come to decisions on cases. Dublin rejects the accusation, arguing that it has been especially meticulous when looking at cases related to tech giants.
Read more: EU must be tougher on Big Tech say France, Germany & Netherlands
The CJEU involvement came after a court in Belgium sought guidance on a challenge by Facebook against the territorial competence of the Belgian data watchdog's attempts to prevent it from tracking users in the country through cookies stored in plug-ins, whether the user has an account or not.
"Under certain conditions, a national supervisory authority may exercise its power to bring any alleged infringement of the GDPR before a court of a member state, even though that authority is not the lead supervisory authority with regard to that processing," the EU Court of Justice (CJEU) said.
Under GDPR, the EU's landmark privacy rules, oversight of Facebook - as well as other companies with European headquarters in Dublin such as Apple, Microsoft, and Google - is conducted by the Irish privacy authority.
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