Latest news with #DataProtectionCommission
The Verge
2 days ago
- Business
- The Verge
ads will be globally introduced to WhatsApp's updates tab
Europeans can enjoy ad-free WhatsApp for a while. While Meta said 'slowly over the next several months,' the company has now clarified to Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DCP) that they won't arrive in the European Union market until 2026. That gives EU privacy regulators time to discuss data-sharing concerns about the ad model.
Irish Examiner
2 days ago
- Business
- Irish Examiner
Data Protection Commission issued fines of €652m in 2024
The Data Protection Commission (DPC) issued fines totalling €652m in 2024, dealing with 11,091 cases from individuals, its 2024 report published on Thursday reveals. In October 2024, the DPC fined networking site LinkedIn €310m as part of a probe into its processing of users' data for behavioural analysis and targeted advertising, while in December 2024, the DPC fined Facebook owner Meta €251m over a data breach. There were 7,781 data breaches confirmed in 2024, representing an 11% increase on 2023. Around half of these breaches were a result of correspondence being sent to the wrong recipient. The DPC concluded 145 valid cross-border complaints as the EU's lead supervisory authority during 2024. A total of 146 electronic direct marketing investigations were concluded in 2024 and the DPC prosecuted eight companies for the sending of unsolicited marketing communications without consent. Meanwhile AI technology must be introduced in a way that protects individuals, especially children and the vulnerable, the Data Protection Commission warned in the report. The introduction of AI will require further safeguarding, and new technological developments must be introduced in a way that protects individuals, especially children and the vulnerable, Commissioner for Data Protection commmissioner and chair Des Hogan said. 'The protection of our personal data is more important than ever as our daily transactions now routinely occur through technologies," Mr Hogan said. "The DPC's wide range of activities during the last year points to how fair, consistent regulation can lead to individuals across Europe trusting that their personal data is being used in a lawful and safe manner and that they have control over their data.' An independent survey of public attitudes carried out in May 2025 on behalf of the DPC found that 61% of people in Ireland are concerned with the use of AI. It also found 77% of respondents are concerned with how children's personal data is being shared and used online while 76% of people were concerned with how personal data is used to create a digital profile of themselves which could can be shared, sold or traded. Concerns over technology and safety of personal data were highest in those aged over 55 while people aged 18-34 were generally less concerned. Just over half of those surveyed believe that data protection laws ensure companies using information do so responsibly, with one in five not aware of how the law effects them. "The findings indicate strong levels of awareness and recognition of the importance of data protection, particularly in the context of emerging technologies, products and services," said DPC commissioner Dale Sunderland. "This insight is critical as we undertake the mid-term review of the DPC Regulatory Strategy."
Irish Examiner
13-06-2025
- Politics
- Irish Examiner
Cianan Brennan: Why didn't government admit its error with biometric public services cards?
Six years ago, the Data Protection Commission (DPC) went mano-a-mano with the government of the day over the infamous public services card, and ended up in a long legal war of attrition. That battle involved a simple question: Could the card be used as a catch-all portal for citizens accessing the State's services, regardless of their wishes? That particular spat was more than a little unedifying, ending up in a wholesale climbdown on the part of the Department of Social Protection in December 2021. However, yesterday's decision by the commission to fine the department €550,000 and order it to suspend the biometric processing of the public's data via the card should be even more seismic. €550,000 is five times the amount of the next-largest fine for breach of GDPR by a public body, and more than half of the maximum allowable. Puzzling defence of the indefensible Six years is a long time, however, and the world is a different place now. This time round, the State may be more willing to take its punishment from its own regulator. That in itself would be borderline farcical. The government — former social protection minister Regina Doherty being probably the most noteworthy culprit — argued for years that the card did not carry biometric data, despite it being plainly obvious to anyone with common sense that it did — in this case, a photo used for facial matching. Why did the State spend hundreds of thousands of euro in taxpayers' money defending the indefensible? The answer may be because it couldn't afford not to. Why did it do so? Because it couldn't afford not to. Having stated until it was blue in the face that black was indeed white, to change tack in any way would have been legally disastrous. Why the government of the day couldn't just hold its hands up and admit fault in the first place, rather than spending hundreds of thousands of euro in taxpayers' money defending the indefensible, we may never definitively know. However, we can speculate. The card is deeply ingrained in Irish society now, but that wasn't the case to quite the same extent in 2019. Furthermore, back then GDPR was brand new. It was so new that the initial investigation into the public service card was carried out under Ireland's previous Data Protection Act. Under that act, the commission had far fewer teeth to impose fines. GDPR is now a firmly embedded, if not universally beloved, EU policy. Maybe in 2019 it was felt the time wasn't right for the government to eat crow on its ambitious biometric card venture. Range of views in data protection community Those we polled yesterday across Ireland's niche data protection community had different views as to whether or not the Government, in the guise of the Department of Social Protection, will go the legal route once more. One said: The circumstances have changed. The data protection and GDPR landscape is much clearer now than it was under the old act. 'It seems more likely than not that this is one that won't be challenged, at least not in court.' However, there was little consensus. 'For years, they [the department] have been shouting that there is no biometric data on the card. Now this decision from the regulator is unequivocal that there is. Can they really back down from that? Would that be in character?' a second expert asked. DPC will defend its decision 'very robustly' Should the Government press the nuclear button once more and appeal the decision to the courts, deciding commissioner Dale Sutherland has made it clear that 'we will very robustly defend our decision'. He said: We are well used to this. It is a feature of our system. There are other puzzling aspects to yesterday's decision, not least the sheer length of time it took. The biometrics investigation had been set in train even before the 2019 decision, which dealt specifically with whether or not the government had the right to make the card mandatory for public services such as passport applications, yet it was only officially commenced in July of 2021. It then took four more years to complete, during which time the card has become ever more embedded in Irish society. That is surely an inordinate amount of time to take over a key investigation concerning personal data. 'This was a complex inquiry with complex issues,' Mr Sutherland said. 'The resources these inquiries take are just extraordinary. This one took a bit of time,' he added, while allowing 'it's probably a bit longer than we would have liked'. Digital Rights Ireland, whose initial complaint spurred the investigations back in 2017, professed itself 'concerned' at the length of time it had taken to finalise the probe. A spokesperson added that the decision 'leaves the Government in a very serious situation', given it has spent 'hundreds of millions of euro on an illegal public service card project'. Mr Sutherland stressed, however, that 'the important thing is that it [the investigation] is done now'. Asked whether the world had moved on in the last six years, he said: 'The principles haven't.'
Irish Examiner
12-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Examiner
Ryanair's Irish business being hampered 'by failed regulation and political inaction', says Michael O'Leary
Ryanair chief executive, Michael O'Leary, has stated that the airline's home market in Dublin is being hampered "by failed regulation and political inaction'. Mr O'Leary makes his comments in Ryanair's 2025 annual report which reveals that this year Mr O'Leary received a remuneration package of €3.83m that included bonus payments of €600,000. The report shows that in the 12 months to the end of March this year, Mr O'Leary received the maximum bonus possible of €600,000 or 50% of basic pay under his contract as Ryanair recorded pre-tax profits of €1.78bn on the back of revenues climbing to €13.94bn. The airline achieved the revenues as passenger numbers increased by 9% to a record 200 million for the first time. Mr O'Leary's pay package was made up of basic pay of €1.2m, a bonus payment of €600,000 and share options of €2.03m. A note attached to the accounts states that the €2.03m component is through the company recording a technical non-cash accounting charge in relation to share options granted to Mr O'Leary. The note states that no such payment was made to Mr O'Leary and the share options remain unvested. At the end of May, Mr O'Leary qualified for share options worth more than €100m as part of a bonus scheme and the 64-year-old will have to stay at Ryanair until the end of July 2028 to collect them. The annual report shows that, while overall Ryanair revenues increased by €505m or 3.75% to €13.94bn, its Irish revenues contracted by 4% from €791m to €757.5m. The airline's Irish business accounted for 5.4% of overall revenues as Italy was the airline's most lucrative market at €2.96bn, followed by Spain at €2.47bn and UK revenues at 2.04bn. Dublin Airport In his message to shareholders, Mr O'Leary said that the home market in Dublin is being 'hampered by failed regulation and political inaction'. He said that at Dublin Airport over €320m has been invested in a new second runway, which doubles the capacity from 32 million to over 60 million passengers per annum. He said that "Dublin's airlines are prevented from using this growth capacity, because an 18-year-old planning restriction artificially caps Dublin Airport traffic at 32 million per annum over fears (in 2007), that road access around Dublin Airport would be 'overwhelmed' at this volume of passengers". He said that Ireland's newly elected Government 'committed to removing this outdated traffic cap, yet three months later no action has been taken'. He said: Only in Ireland would we allow this vital access infrastructure to be built, but then refuse our airlines and citizens the ability to use it, due to bureaucratic failure to abolish an absurd and outdated planning restriction. "This is a clear example of the sort of regulatory failure, which the Draghi Report has encouraged Europe to reform and remove.' Booking verification The annual report also makes reference to the Data Protection Commission (DPC) here launching an inquiry into Ryanair's booking verification process last October. The report states that Ryanair has engaged with the DPC "explaining that its verification requirement is designed to ensure compliance with safety and security protocols, and that the process of verification fully complies with the requirements of the GDPR". The report says that the inquiry is expected to take at least one year "and while Ryanair is confident in its position, the DPC may ultimately find that the verification process has not fully complied with the GDPR, which could lead to the imposition of a substantial fine". Boeing planes In his message to shareholders, Mr O'Leary says that 'the biggest medium-term challenge we face, remains the risk to Boeing deliveries'. He said: 'While the final units of our 210 Boeing 737-8200 order were contracted to deliver in December 2024, at our March 2025 year end Boeing left us short 34 of these deliveries. 'We got five more in April but the remaining 29 are not expected to deliver until the second half of FY26, hopefully in time for summer 2026. The quality and timeliness of Boeing deliveries has recently improved under their new management, but this needs to be reflected in rising monthly production if Boeing is to erase its current delivery backlog.' Mr O'Leary says that over the next decade Ryanair hopes to buy 300 more Boeing MAX-10 aircraft, to grow to 300 million guests per annum and to create approximately 10,000 new jobs. The aggregate amount of compensation paid by Ryanair to its key management personnel was €14.7m including a €4.2m non-cash technical accounting charge in relation to unvested share options. In the 12 months to the end of March, the airline employed an average of 27,076 as staff costs totalled €1.75bn.
Irish Daily Mirror
12-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Daily Mirror
Michael O'Leary's 2025 pay revealed as Ryanair boss banked megabucks bonuses
Ryanair chief executive, Michael O'Leary this year received a pay-package of €3.83m that included bonus payments of €600,000. That is according to the 2025 annual report by Ryanair which shows that Mr O'Leary received the maximum bonus possible of €600,000 or 50pc of basic pay under his contract as Ryanair recorded pre-tax profits of €1.78bn on the back of revenues climbing to €13.94bn. The airline achieved the revenues as passenger numbers increased by 9pc to a record 200m for the first time. Mr O'Leary's pay package was made up of basic pay of €1.2m, a bonus payment of €600,000 and share options of €2.03m. A note attached to the accounts states that the €2.03m component is through the company recording a technical non-cash accounting charge in relation to share options granted to Mr O'Leary. The note states that no such payment was made to Mr O'Leary and the share options remain unvested. At the end of May, Mr O'Leary qualified for share options worth more than €100m and the 64 year-old will have to stay at Ryanair until the end of July 2028 to collect the share options. The annual report shows that Ryanair's Irish based revenues last year totalled €757.5m which were down 4pc on the Irish revenues of €791m. The airline's Irish business accounted for 5.4pc of overall revenues as Italy was the airline's most lucrative market at €2.96bn, followed by Spain at €2.47bn and UK revenues of €2.04bn In his message to shareholders, Mr O'Leary said that 'our home market in Dublin is also being hampered by failed regulation and political inaction'. He said that at Dublin airport over €320m has been invested in a new second runway, which doubles the capacity of Ireland's main airport from 32m to over 60m passengers per annum. He said that "Dublin's airlines are prevented from using this growth capacity, because an 18-year-old planning restriction artificially caps Dublin Airport traffic at 32m p.a, over fears (in 2007), that road access around Dublin Airport would be 'overwhelmed' at this volume of passengers". He said that Ireland's newly elected Government committed to removing this outdated traffic cap, yet three months later no action has been taken. He said: 'Only in Ireland would we allow this vital access infrastructure to be built, but then refuse our airlines and citizens the ability to use it, due to bureaucratic failure to abolish an absurd and outdated planning restriction. This is a clear example of the sort of regulatory failure, which the Draghi Report has encouraged Europe to reform and remove.' The annual report also makes reference to the Data Protection Commission (DPC) here launching an inquiry into Ryanair's booking verification process last October. The report states that Ryanair has engaged with the DPC "explaining that its verification requirement is designed to ensure compliance with safety and security protocols, and that the process of verification fully complies with the requirements of the GDPR". The report states that the inquiry is expected to take at least one year "and while Ryanair is confident in its position, the DPC may ultimately find that the verification process has not fully complied with the GDPR, which could lead to the imposition of a substantial fine". In his message to shareholders, Mr O'Leary says that 'the biggest medium term challenge we face, remains the risk to Boeing deliveries'. He said: 'While the final units of our 210 Boeing 737-8200 order were contracted to deliver in December 2024, at our March 2025 year end Boeing left us short 34 of these deliveries. He said: 'We got five more in April but the remaining 29 are not expected to deliver until the second half of FY26, hopefully in time for summer 2026. The quality and timeliness of Boeing deliveries has recently improved under their new management, but this needs to be reflected in rising monthly production if Boeing is to erase its current delivery backlog.' Mr O'Leary states that over the next decade Ryanair hope to buy 300 more Boeing MAX-10 aircraft, to grow to 300m guests per annum and to create approximately 10,000 new jobs. The aggregate amount of compensation paid by Ryanair to its key management personnel was €14.7m including a €4.2m non-cash technical accounting charge in relation to unvested share options. In the 12 months to the end of March, the airline employed an average of 27,076 as staff costs totalled €1.75bn.
