Norway bans Meta's behavioral advertising with threats of wrist-slap fines Norwegian data protection authorities have temporarily banned Meta from tracking users for the purposes of serving ads, and threatened the US company with fines of one million Kroner per day if it doesn't comply. Before you start cackling like Dr Evil, that's about $100K. Meta will not be too concerned about the impact on its …
Sort of. The EU is a complex thing, what with everyone pushing and pulling to get as much as possible while giving as little as possible. A country can be in for some aspects, and out for others. In the case of Norway, my guess is that maybe they are not subject to the CJEU, but they still take its rulings in high consideration and, in this case, as a strong indicator that they should take action. Or, alternatively, they may be "in" with regards to data protection, which requires abiding by CJEU rulings on that topic. Or maybe CJEU compliance comes with the EEA agreement, I'm not sure. Point is, "not in the EU" is true, but also an oversimplification.
Maybe, but the OP, presumably a regular person just like you and me, seems to be confused by this. And if you look at the comments page on pretty much anything to do with EU jurisdiction, you'll find that's just one of many, many mistakes regular people make on the topic of which treaties apply to which countries.
So, yeah, it's not rocket science, but it's not as obvious as "people in France are subject to French courts" either, or as "all countries in the EU share the exact same treaties".
More to the point, it's a complexity that politicians love to exploit to spread confusion or outright lies, when it suits them. Therefore, I think there's merit in reminding people to double check exactly which treaties apply to which countries, when trying to understand European affairs.
The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has explainers (in English).
Norway and the EU - 10 facts about the EEA
Norway and the EU - The EEA Agreement
The confusing bit is that although Norway is a member of the internal market of the EU aka the 'single market', it is not in a customs union with the EU, so Norway can negotiate its own trade deals, and apply different customs tariffs to goods. An example of this is tariffs on cheese. EU cheese producers are free to sell cheese in Norway - they don't need phytosanitary checks at the border etc. However, in response to lobbying by Norwegian farmers, a tariff of 277% was imposed on imported cheese, which EU producers did not like.
News in English.no: EU blasts Norway’s protectionism
The UK, subsequent to its withdrawal from the EU, negotiated a separate agreement with Norway, which reduced the tariffs on certain types of Cheddar, Caerphilly, and Wensleydale (I am not making this up).
In principle, the UK could have aimed for a 'Norway deal': i.e. be a member of the EEA, but not the EU; but Norway wasn't keen on the idea.
The Guardian: Take it from a Norwegian MP: we don’t want Britain in the EEA
Norway is not directly subject to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), but through the EEA agreement the EFTA states have their own court and surveillance bodies - The EFTA Surveillance Authority (ESA) and the EFTA Court, and the EFTA court abides by decision of the CJEU.
the EFTA Court shall follow the relevant case law of the ECJ on provisions of Union law that are identical in substance to provisions of EEA law rendered prior to the date of signature of the EEA Agreement (2 May 1992) and shall pay due account to the principles laid down by the European Court of Justice's relevant case law rendered after that date. The EFTA Court's jurisprudence is in fact based on the case law of the European Court of Justice (ECJ).
So even if the UK had 'joined' the EEA, there would still have been a supranational court, aligned with the CJEU, administering the common law applying to the EEA/EFTA members.
So yes, it's not especially complicated.
So, Meta makes over $5.5 billion per quarter for nothing good or wholesome.
No wonder ad services are considered the holy grail. Anybody who wants to make money wants ads to fling left, right and center.
Actually providing a service worthy of subscription is so last milennia . . .
Norway only has 5 million people. (In total. No idea how many of them use Facebook, but it's unlikely to be more than that.) How much money do you think Meta makes out of advertising to them?
A million kroner a day is real money and will substantially affect Meta's profits in that country. It won't beggar the global company, obviously, but it will make them look for different ways of doing things at least in Norway. Which is the objective.
I do wonder if regulators (across sectors and around the world) are still thinking in terms of normal companies doing good old fashioned making of stuff. Rather than enormous multi-national megacorps making insane amounts of money by skimming across everyone's lives.
There is a general, popular confusion between a lot of money for myself and a lot of money for a multinational (or a nation).
To me and the rest of the public a million quid is a fair chunk of money and mufti-millions seems an incredible amount. But to corporates and nations it's a rounding error.
I wonder if the regulators are still thinking like the public, ditto politicians. and whether this is deliberate because they know that the public will fall for it and their friends in wealthy places won't be bothered.
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