Italian authorities fine Meta 805 million euros over privacy violations

On November 14, 2026, the Italian Data Protection Authority imposed a record fine of 805 million euros on Meta Platforms. The regulator determined that the company accessed photos and videos from users' Android devices without providing proper notification or obtaining informed consent.

The investigation revealed that a Facebook feature automatically suggested content from users' personal photo and video galleries for publication without their explicit permission. This practice violated European data privacy regulations regarding user authorization and transparency.

As a consequence of this ruling, the Italian authority has granted Meta a 60-day deadline to disable this feature by default. Moving forward, the company must obtain separate, explicit consent from users before accessing their personal media collections. While Meta has not yet publicly contested the timeline, the decision represents a significant enforcement action regarding unauthorized data harvesting from private smartphone archives.