November 10, 2015
A Belgian court on Monday gave Facebook 48 hours to stop tracking internet users who do not have accounts with the social network or risk fines of up to €250,000 a day.
Facebook said it would appeal against the order, which followed a case lodged by Belgium’s privacy watchdog in June saying the US company indiscriminately tracks internet users when they visit pages on the site or click “like” or “share”, even if they are not members.
The court said in a statement: “Today the judge … ordered the social network Facebook to stop tracking and registering internet usage by people who surf the internet in Belgium, in the 48 hours which follow this statement,” the court said.
“If Facebook ignores this order it must pay a fine of €250,000 a day to the Belgian privacy commission.”