Austrian activist Schrems broadens complaint about Meta’s paid ad-free service

Austrian privacy activist Max Schrems’s advocacy group Noyb on Thursday expanded its complaint about Meta’s paid no-ads subscription service as it urged the Austrian privacy watchdog to investigate the difficulty users face when they want to withdraw their consent to being tracked.

The additional complaint came nearly two months after Noyb told the Austrian Data Protection Authority that Meta's no-ads subscription service launched in Europe in November was equivalent to paying a fee to ensure privacy.

Meta has said the new service which applies to Facebook and Instagram aims to comply with EU rules that users must be given a choice whether their data can be collected and used for targeted ads.

Users who consent to be tracked get a free, ad-supported service.

“While one (free) click is enough to consent to being tracked, users can only withdraw their consent by going through the complicated process of switching to a paid subscription,” Noyb said in a statement.

It urged the Austrian watchdog to order Meta to provide users with an easy way to withdraw their consent and also slap it with a fine.

The complaint will likely be forwarded to the Irish data protection watchdog which oversees Meta because it has its European headquarters in Dublin. A ruling by the Irish privacy watchdog would apply across the EU. – Reuters