Germany slaps Facebook with a 2 million Euro fine

Facebook has been slapped with a 2 million Euro fine by German authorities for under-reporting complaints about illegal content on its website according to a report from Reuters.

The firm reported just over a thousand complaints for half a year, while Twitter and YouTube reported over 250, 000 for the whole year. This was due to how Facebook chose to tally its report, choosing to report only a certain number of complaints. According to Germany’s Office of Justice, this leads to s skewed picture of just how many violations were occurring, leading to artificially low numbers.

“It is quite clear that Facebook’s community standards do not correspond to the standards of the law,” Germany’s Ghcrsine Labrecht told reporters on Tuesday.

Under German laws, social media platforms are directed to report the number of illegal content reports they’ve received, Facebook’s actions subverted the purpose of that law.