Facebook privacy case sent to Europe

The European Court of Justice (ECJ) is to be asked to examine the law governing data protection following a student’s legal challenge over the rejection of his complaint about interference with personal privacy by the mass transfer of data by Facebook to the US intelligence services.

Max Schrems, an Austrian post-graduate law student behind a data privacy campaign group called ‘Europe v Facebook’, brought a High Court challenge claiming Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner Billy Hawkes wrongly interpreted and applied the law governing the mass transfer of personal data of Facebook users to the US National Security Agency (NSA).

Mr Hawkes found Mr Schrems’ complaint did not meet the threshold required to merit investigation.