July 17,2023: Social media giants Facebook and Instagram will soon be temporarily banned in Norway from tracking users online to target them with advertising.
The Norwegian Data Protection Authority ordered U.S. technology firm Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to stop showing users in Norway personalized ads based on their online activity and estimated locations. The ban kicks in from August, according to an order obtained exclusively by POLITICO and sent to Meta on July 14.
Meta’s advertising practice on Facebook and Instagram currently involves the “processing of very private and sensitive personal data through highly opaque and intrusive monitoring and profiling operations,” wrote Norway’s Datatilsynet agency.
The ban on so-called behavioral advertising will last three months, starting from August 4. Facebook and Instagram will be able to show people customized ads but only based on information given by users in the “about” section of their profiles.
Meta will face daily fines of 1 million Norwegian Krone (€89,500) if it doesn’t comply with the order.
The temporary ban could be lifted if Meta finds a way to legally process personal data and give users the rights to opt out of targeted advertising based on tracking, the order said.
The restriction comes after the Court of Justice of the European Union on July 4 ruled that Meta was unlawfully collecting people’s data to target them with ads without their explicit consent and based on the firm’s “legitimate interest.”
Meta is also currently under scrutiny from its lead privacy regulator, the Irish Data Protection Commission, over its advertising practices. The Dublin-based authority fined the social media company in January a total of €390 million for infringing Europeans’ privacy. It ordered Meta to find a new legal basis for its business model. The tech company has appealed the decision.
The Irish Data Protection Commission plans on making a decision on Meta’s legal basis for its targeted advertising operations “by no later than mid-August,” said the agency’s Deputy Commissioner and Spokesperson Graham Doyle.
The Irish regulator oversees Meta under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) for the whole of Europe because the tech company has its regional headquarters there. Other European countries such as Norway are able to issue national decisions for a time limit of three months in a “case of urgency” under the GDPR.
“The persistent state of non-compliance following the [Irish] decisions demand[s] immediate action to protect the rights and freedoms of European data subjects,” wrote the Norwegian data agency in its order.
The Norwegian regulator is the first European privacy authority to severely restrict Meta’s data-driven business following the EU’s top court ruling. It said it also plans to request an urgent binding decision from the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) — the region’s network of privacy regulators — to decide on final measures.
The Irish Data Protection Commission said it has consulted with other European authorities and sent them a provisional assessment of Meta’s compliance with the GDPR for targeted advertising following the new court ruling. Authorities have until July 21 to make their submissions to the Irish DPC, Doyle said.
In a response, Matt Pollard, spokesperson for Meta, said: “The debate around legal bases has been ongoing for some time and businesses continue to face a lack of regulatory certainty in this area … We continue to constructively engage with the Irish DPC, our lead regulator in the EU, regarding our compliance with its decision. We will review the Norway DPA’s decision, and there is no immediate impact to our services.”
July 06,2023:Ten million users signed up for Meta’s newly launched Threads app in its first seven hours, the company’s chief Mark Zuckerberg says.
He pitched the app as a “friendly” rival to Twitter, which was bought by Elon Musk in October.
Experts say Threads could attract Twitter users unhappy with recent changes to the platform.
Threads allows users to post up to 500 characters, and has many features similar to Twitter.
Earlier, Mr Zuckerberg said keeping the platform “friendly… will ultimately be the key to its success”.
But Mr Musk responded: “It is infinitely preferable to be attacked by strangers on Twitter, than indulge in the false happiness of hide-the-pain Instagram.”
When asked on Threads whether the app will be “bigger than Twitter”, Mr Zuckerberg said: “It’ll take some time, but I think there should be a public conversations app with 1 billion+ people on it.
“Twitter has had the opportunity to do this but hasn’t nailed it. Hopefully we will.”
Competitors have criticised the amount of data the app might use. This may include health, financial, and browsing data linked to users’ identities, according to the Apple App Store.
Some users have also expressed concern that it is not possible to delete your Threads profile without deleting the associated Instagram profile. Meta told the BBC: “At this time, you can’t delete your Threads profile without deleting your Instagram account. This is something we’re working on. In the meantime, you can deactivate your Threads profile at any time.
“Deactivating your Threads profile will not deactivate your Instagram account”.
Deactivation will mean your Threads profile, your posts and interactions with others’ posts won’t be visible, the firm added.
Users can download and delete Threads data by visiting their Instagram settings, Meta says.
Threads is now available to download in over 100 countries including the UK, but not yet in the EU because of regulatory concerns.
New Delhi, July 5,2023: Union Cabinet has approved the draft of Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Bill 2023.
According to official sources, the bill is likely to be tabled during the upcoming monsoon session of Parliament.
The Centre introduced the Personal Data Protection Bill 2019 in Parliament in December 2019. The Bill was sent for consideration to the Joint Committee of Parliament. The Joint Committee, after consultations, submitted a report to the Speaker. In view of the feedback by stakeholders and various agencies, the Bill was withdrawn in August 2022.
On November 18, 2022, the government published a new draft Bill, titled the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill 2022, and initiated a public consultation on this draft. A comprehensive and detailed consultation was held on this subject.
21,666 comments were received from the public and a series of consultations were held with 46 sector organisations, associations and industry bodies. Comments were also received from 38 ministries/ departments of the Government of India.
The reintroduced draft Digital Personal Data Protection Bill 2022 proposed six types of penalties on non-companies to companies. To prevent a personal data breach, a penalty of up to Rs 250 core is being proposed in the draft bill which was put out for public comments.
Besides, failure to notify the Board and affected Data Principals in the event of a personal data breach and non-fulfilment of additional obligations in relation to Children may attract a penalty of up to Rs 200 crore.
Non-fulfilment of additional obligations of Significant Data Fiduciary under sections 11 and 16 of the Act may attract Rs 150 crore and Rs 10 crore fines, respectively.
Lastly, non-compliance with provisions of this Act other than those listed in (1) to (5) and any rule made thereunder will attract penalties up to Rs 50 crore.
Points that emerged in the course of consultations and comments were thoroughly studied and the draft Digital Personal Data Protection Bill 2023 was finalised.
The purpose of this Act, the draft said, is to provide for the processing of digital personal data in a manner that recognizes both the right of individuals to protect their personal data and the need to process personal data for lawful purposes.
During the drafting of the Personal Data Protection Bill in 2019, the government said that the entire gamut of principles was widely debated and discussed. These include the rights of individuals, duties of entities processing personal data and regulatory framework, among others.
The first principle of the proposed Bill is that usage of personal data by organisations must be done in a manner that is lawful, fair to the individuals concerned and transparent.
The second principle of purpose limitation is that the personal data is used for the purposes for which it was collected. The third principle of data minimisation is that only those items of personal data required for attaining a specific purpose must be collected.
Among others, personal data should be limited to such duration as is necessary for the stated purpose for which personal data was collected and reasonable safeguards to ensure that there is no unauthorised collection or processing of personal data are some features.
Thiruvananthapuram, May 24 ,2023: Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan will make the ‘Total e-Governance Kerala’ declaration here on May 25, as God’s Own Country becomes India’s total e-governed state, marking a major stride in its journey towards a knowledge-based society and economy besides achieving cent per cent digital literacy.
This unique achievement, which comes decades after Kerala became the first fully literate Indian state and began its quest to become a fully e-literate society, has been realised through a set of visionary policy initiatives of the Government seeking to transform the state into a digitally empowered society.
Besides digitising the delivery of government services to the people by making them transparent and inclusive, total e-governance will also ensure the inclusion of all sections of society, including the less privileged and marginalised.
The achievement enables online delivery of the whole range of government services by leveraging state-of-the-art technology and platforms. The Government has built a single window service delivery mechanism called e-Sevanam which integrates more than 800 plus government services online.
Keeping in tune with the vision of the Chief Minister for the transparent and speedy delivery of services to all, the state IT Mission has also created a set of digitised platforms and applications including e-Office File Flow, taking it down to the village office level.
The delivery of all vital services has already been digitised, covering all key domains including health, education, land revenue, documentation of properties, public distribution system and social security payouts.
Over the period, the state has also successfully carried out a clutch of major projects like eDistrict, K-Swift, EHealth, ePDS, eCourt management, ERSS, Pol App, Cyber DOM, KITE, HSCAP and Digital Survey Mission.
Kerala IT Mission, the nodal agency for the implementation of digitisation initiative, has made all services easily accessible for people of all strata of society.
The total e-governance will also help bridging the digital divide by making digital infrastructure to all at affordable cost, which is critical in transforming Kerala into a digital society to achieve sustainable economic growth.
In its policy initiatives, the state government has, over the last few years, emphasised on the importance of Information Technology as the key instrument of social development and economic growth.
The roll-out of KFON (Kerala Fibre Optic Network) will be a decisive step forward in this direction. Kerala stands out as the first Indian state to declare access to the Internet as a citizen’s right.
Making fast-paced progress, the state also emerged top in the National e-Service Delivery Assessment conducted by the Government of India.
The Chief Minister will make the historic declaration at a function at Nishagandhi Auditorium in the state capital at 4.30 pm.
Feb 03,2023:The definition of broadband now requires a minimum speed of 2Mbps from telecom operators, after previously requiring a fourth of that bandwidth, 512Kbps, since 2009. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) notified the change in a January 25 gazette notification published on Thursday.
“Broadband is a data connection that is able to support interactive services including Internet access and has the capability of the minimum download speed of 2 Mbps to an individual subscriber from the point of presence (POP) of the service provider intending to provide Broadband service,” the new definition says.
While broadband is generally understood to mean home WiFi connections, government statistics include faster mobile internet connections in the category. Wired broadband and wireless broadband will both be subject to this 2Mbps limit.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) had formally recommended the new speed to the DoT in September 2021. By the previous definition, there were 825.38 million broadband users in India in November 2022, according to TRAI data.
Dec 15,2022:Passkeys are now available to use in Chrome. Google added the passwordless secure login standard this week to Chrome Stable M108 after going through a testing period that started in October.
The feature now works using Chrome on both desktop and mobile running Windows 11, macOS, and Android. Google also lets you sync passkeys from Android to other devices through either the company’s own password manager or a third-party one that supports it, like 1Password or Dashlane.
A passkey is a unique identity that’s stored on your computer, phone, or other device like a USB security key. For websites or applications that have implemented the passkey API, it can let you log in through a simple and quick confirmation combined with your device’s biometrics or other secure authentication.
Passkeys are great for security in that there’s no password involved that could get leaked. And since all of the major tech companies like Apple, Google, and Microsoft are working together in adopting the technology (and the name), the experience should become device-agnostic. The tech is built on the FIDO standard using public key cryptography, which is what makes the cross-platform aspect possible.
The usefulness of passkeys in Chrome — and other browsers — will come down to sites implementing the WebAuthn API to accept passkeys. Some online stores like Best Buy have already added it, and services like PayPal also have it enabled.