Italy fines Meta $887 million for accessing user photos without consent

The Italian data protection agency reported this Saturday (14) that it fined Meta 805 million euros (US$887 million or R$5.02 billion) after finding that the company accessed photos and videos of Android users without obtaining their consent or informing them.

Meta had access to Android users' photos and videos through a feature in the Facebook app that suggested content from users' personal galleries for them to post, the authority said in a statement.

Meta has 60 days to disable the feature by default and request users' consent separately, it added. The owner of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram was not immediately available for comment.

The investigation, which began in 2025, did not cover the possible use of the content to train artificial intelligence models, a practice that Meta denied, the authority said.

The authority added that it reserves the right to separately evaluate a new feature, launching in 2026, that allows content from users' galleries to be processed in the cloud.

The fine is equivalent to around 0.47% of the group's global revenue, the authority said.