Review of GDPR fines and data breaches 2020

The data protection authorities of Germany’s federal states issued 283 fines in 2020, three of which ran into the millions – including the highest ever imposed in Germany to date as a result of violations of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR): a fine of around €35.3 million issued to H&M. All in all, however, the fines are much lower and they relate to natural persons or small enterprises. In addition, a total of 8,943 data breaches in accordance with Article 33 GDPR were reported.

Flood of complaints about Google Analytics

German supervisory authorities have received 200,000 complaints about the inadmissible use of Google Analytics.

Third review of EU-US Privacy Shield

The EU Commission has reviewed the EU-US Privacy Shield for the third time.

Preset consent is unlawful

The ECJ has issued a far-reaching ruling on the use of cookies stipulating that no effective consent to the storage of cookies has been given by the internet user if the website operator employs a checkbox with preset checkmarks.

Facebook’s „Like“ button - website operator liable

The European Court of Justice has imposed stricter requirements on website operators for „Like“ buttons. The integration of social plug-ins can establish a joint responsibility of the website operator and Facebook.