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Title: TikTok fined $602 million for illegally sending European user data to
China

Date: Fri, 02 May 2025 15:48:08 +0000
Link: https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/tiktok-fine...

The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) has fined TikTok owner ByteDance
Γé¼530 million ($602 million) for breaching the European Union's privacy
laws. The regulator said TikTok sent European user data to China without
being able to guarantee that the information was safe from government
surveillance.

It was reported last month that the DPC was going to slap TikTok with such a
fine ΓÇö the third-largest ever for a General Data Protection Regulation
(GDPR) breach. The regulator confirmed that on Friday.

The DPC, which handles enforcement of the GDPR when it comes to TikTok (which
has its European HQ in Ireland), also ruled that the platform wasn't
adequately transparent with users. Along with the fine, the DPC gave TikTok
six months to halt all illegal data transfers.

TikTok claimed during the four-year probe that it didn't store data from
European Economic Area users on servers in China. However, it told the DPC
last month it learned in February that "limited EEA User Data" had been
stored there and admitted that contradicted what it previously said to
regulators.

"The DPC is taking these recent developments regarding the storage of EEA
User Data on servers in China very seriously," DPC deputy commissioner Graham
Doyle said in a statement. "Whilst TikTok has informed the DPC that the data
has now been deleted, we are considering what further regulatory action may
be warranted, in consultation with our peer EU Data Protection Authorities."

The DPC said that, between 2020 and 2022, TikTok didn't tell users that their
data was being transferred to China. The regulator says TikTok met its
transparency requirements in 2022 after updating its privacy policy. Still,
the breach of transparency rules resulted in a Γé¼45 million fine. The data
transfers to China led to a Γé¼485 million penalty.

"TikTokΓÇÖs personal data transfers to China infringed the GDPR because
TikTok failed to verify, guarantee and demonstrate that the personal data of
EEA users, remotely accessed by staff in China, was afforded a level of
protection essentially equivalent to that guaranteed within the EU," Doyle
said. "As a result of TikTokΓÇÖs failure to undertake the necessary
assessments, TikTok did not address potential access by Chinese authorities
to EEA personal data under Chinese anti-terrorism, counter-espionage and
other laws identified by TikTok as materially diverging from EU standards."

TikTok said in a statement that it disagrees with the ruling and it plans to
appeal in full. It claims that Chinese officials had never requested European
user data and that it had never provided such information to the country's
authorities.

The platform also contends that the DPC did not fully consider Project Clover
in its decision. That initiative concerns privacy safeguards, such as setting
up European data centers to store data locally. The DPC decision "focuses on
a select period from years ago, prior to CloverΓÇÖs 2023 implementation and
does not reflect the safeguards now in place," Christine Grahn, TikTok's head
of public policy and government relations for Europe, said. However, the DPC
said it "considered ongoing changes" related to Project Clover while making
the ruling.

This is not the first time that the DPC has fined Bytedance. In 2023, it
handed down a $368 million penalty after determining TikTok failed to protect
the data of users aged between 13 and 17. EU regulators have other ongoing
investigations into TikTok over whether it failed to meet obligations to stop
foreign interference in an election; age verification and addictive algorithm
concerns; and an alleged failure to submit a risk assessment report ahead of
rolling out TikTok Lite in France and Spain.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-
tech/tiktok-fined-602-million-for-illegally-sending-european-user-data-to-
china-154807194.html?src=rss

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