Ireland Opens Third Apple Data Protection Probe

Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) has opened its third privacy probe into Apple, as stricter provisions under Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) have an increasingly broad influence.

The investigation is examining whether Apple complied with GDPR rules in relation to a customer request, Reuters reported.

The probe, which began within the past few weeks, is the Irish DPC’s twentieth into multinational companies with headquarters in the country.

The two other Apple investigations involve the way Apple processes data used for targeted advertising on its platforms and whether its privacy policy is transparent enough.

Stricter rules

Facebook is the DPC’s most highly scrutinised company, with eight distinct probes into the company itself, as well as an additional two into its WhatsApp subsidiary and one into its Instagram service.

Twitter is the subject of three DPC probes, with Google, Microsoft’s LinkedIn and US digital advertising company Quantcast the subject of one DPC investigation each.

The GDPR took effect in May of last year and regulators across Europe soon began registering a significantly higher volume of complaints.

The UK Information Commissioner’s Office in May said it had received four times the volume of data breach notifications in the GDPR’s first year, compared with the previous 12 months.

The French regulator in January fined Google 50 million euros (£44m) under GDPR data transparency provisions.