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Meta was unavailable for comment. The regulator said the fine was equivalent to about 0.47 per cent of the company's global revenue.
Meta has denied using the material for that purpose, the regulator said. (Photo: Unsplash)
New Delhi,Nov 14, 2026 22:56 IST
Italy’s data protection regulator has fined Meta €805 million (about US$887 million) for accessing photos and videos stored on Android phones through the Facebook app without informing users or getting their consent.
The regulator said on Saturday that a Facebook feature accessed users’ phone galleries to suggest photos and videos they could share on the platform. It gave Meta 60 days to turn the feature off by default and seek separate consent from users who want to enable it.
Meta was unavailable for comment. The regulator said the fine was equivalent to about 0.47 per cent of the company’s global revenue.
The investigation began in 2025 and did not examine whether the photos and videos were used to train artificial intelligence models. Meta has denied using the material for that purpose, the regulator said.
The watchdog said it could separately examine a feature Meta launched in 2026 that allows photos and videos from users’ phone galleries to be processed on remote servers.
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