The Data Protection Commission has fined Instagram 405 million euro for breaking the privacy rights of children.
The commission says full details of the fine will be published next week.
Spin's Tech Correspondent Jess Kelly says it's a significant penalty - following a two-year investigation.
"There were two key issues at the heart of this inquiry."
"Firstly was Facebook Ireland's practice of allowing users aged between 13 and 17 to have business accounts on the platform."
"That required or facilitated their phone numbers and/or email addresses being published publicly."
"The second element was, at times Facebook Ireland ltd operated a user registration system for Instagram whereby the accounts of child users were public by default."
Statement from Meta issued to @NewstalkFM in the last few minutes pic.twitter.com/WlNtesGtls
— Jess Kelly 👩🏻💻 (@jesskellynt) September 5, 2022
Instagram Appeal
However, Instagram says it disagrees with how the fine was calculated and intends to appeal it.
It also says the inquiry was focused on old settings that were updated over a year ago.
The company says it has since released many new features to help keep teens safe, and their information private.
