The Irish privacy advocates have imposed a record fine on the WhatsApp messenger service.
Due to a lack of transparency in the transfer of personal data, the Facebook subsidiary had to pay 225 million euros, the data protection authority DPC ruled on Thursday, which has never imposed such a high fine.
At the same time, the DPC issued a reprimand and demanded certain steps from the US group.
WhatsApp described the sentence as "completely inappropriate" and announced that it would appeal.
Because Facebook has its European headquarters in Dublin, the DPC is the authority responsible for data protection issues. The most recent sentence dates back to an investigation into the disclosure of data that began in 2018. In the past, the authority has repeatedly been criticized by other European supervisory authorities for taking too long to take their decisions. In July, the European supervisory authority EDPB intervened and asked the DPC to increase the WhatsApp penalty originally planned.