Facebook, Netflix Fined Over Privacy Violations in S Korea

On Wednesday, a South Korean watchdog for personal data protection fined major international platform service providers about 6.7 billion won ($5.7 million) for violating privacy laws.

Following its investigation, the Personal Information Protection Commission fined Facebook, Netflix, and Google and ordered them to rectify the issues.

Facebook received the most severe penalty of 6.46 billion won. Between April 2018 and September 2019, the US-based social network service provider developed and stored face recognition templates for 200,000 local users without their knowledge, according to the commission.

The new Facebook fine is the committee's second largest.In November 2020, the committee ordered Facebook to pay 6.7 billion won and requested a criminal inquiry for disclosing personal information without users' consent to third parties.

Facebook was also accused of illegally collecting people's home registration numbers and failing to notify users of changes to its personal information management.

Netflix was fined over 220 million won for gathering the personal information of 5 million users without their agreement before the service registration procedure was finished. The multimedia streaming behemoth was also blamed for failing to provide information on personal data transfers outside of the nation.