Tech giants accused of data protection breaches by Austrian activist

Tech giants Apple and Amazon have been named in a complaint filed by Noyb, claiming they are still failing to comply with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The company, chaired by data privacy activist and lawyer Max Schrems, filed a complaint in Austria also naming Netflix, Spotify and Youtube after it tested the data the companies held about users.

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Noyb said none of the companies fully complied with the regulation, which gives users the right to access their private data and information about it.

Tech companies must get Europeans’ consent each time they want to use their data for a new purpose, such as targeted advertising.

GDPR projects fines of up to four per cent of global revenues for companies in breach of the ruse.

Amazon responded to the complaint by saying it had installed a new privacy help page which shows customers how to manage their data on its website.

“We comply with any request from a data subject to provide access to the personal data that Amazon is processing,” Amazon said on Friday.

A spokeswoman for Spotify said: “We are committed to complying with all relevant national and international laws and regulations, including GDPR, with which we believe we are fully compliant.”

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“Many services set up automated systems to respond to access requests, but they often don’t even remotely provide the data that every user has a right to,” Schrems said.

“This leads to structural violations of users’ rights, as these systems are built to withhold the relevant information.”