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RTÉ News
25-05-2025
- Business
- RTÉ News
ICCL to take case against Microsoft over advertising system
The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) said it will apply to the High Court today to launch a class action lawsuit against Microsoft over its "real-time bidding" (RTB) advertising system. RTB is the process of auctioning advertising space as people browse online. The ICCL said the system involves broadcasting private information about internet users and has described it as a breach of users' data privacy. The council said that Microsoft's RTB system operates behind the scenes on websites and apps to match advertising to specific people. The ICCL said it is taking the legal action on behalf of all affected people in Ireland under the new EU Collective Redress Directive. Dr Johnny Ryan, Director of ICCL's Enforce unit, is leading the case. "People's intimate secrets such as their relationship, work and financial status are broadcast by Microsoft into the real-time bidding advertising system," Dr Ryan said. "That system is a black hole of data open to any malicious actor and represents a huge data breach of millions of people's information," he added. A Microsoft spokesperson said the company intends to respond to the ICCL filing through the appropriate legal channels.
Irish Independent
25-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Independent
Microsoft faces class action lawsuit in High Court for online ad system
The case, citing the Representative Actions Directive, is being taken by the Irish Council Of Civil Liberties, which claims that Microsoft is flouting European GDPR privacy law through its use of 'real time bidding' (RTB) in online advertising, a system that allows advertisers to bid for online ads based on traits and characteristics of the person looking at a web page. The ICCL claims that RTB constitutes a 'data breach' that flouts GDPR rules, because it collects too much personal information about internet users and then loses control of it online. The organisation has been waging war on Big Tech firms like Google and Meta, as well as the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC), over the online ad system in recent years. Last year, the High Court and Court Of Appeal rejected a legal case by the ICCL that had claimed the Irish DPC didn't adequately investigate Google for using 'real time bidding' as an ad system. The ICCL is hoping that the EU's new consumer-friendly class action legal rules will give it a better chance of success. It is targeting Microsoft for its use of 'real-time bidding' ad technology in Windows, web-based Office (including Outlook, Word and Excel), Microsoft's Edge web browser, Xbox and other websites that use Microsoft's 'Xandr' advertising technology. "People's intimate secrets such as their relationship, work and financial status are broadcast by Microsoft into the real-time bidding advertising system, which is is a black hole of data open to any malicious actor and represents a huge data breach of millions of people's information,' said Dr Johnny Ryan, director of the ICCL's Enforce unit. "Microsoft has no way of knowing what happens to the personal data after it is broadcasted. This a data breach, pure and simple. Microsoft is exposing us all individually to malicious profiling and discrimination, and in doing so it is also undermining European security.' The ICCL says it conducted its own investigation, posing as an online data buyer, to explore the type of personal information available through the system. 'Posing as a data buyer, ICCL Enforce obtained thousands of RTB data segments about Irish people,' the organisation said. 'These include information such as whether a person gambles, their finances and debt, and even such sensitive information as whether the person works in a sensitive national security role.' The ICCL is represented by James Doherty SC, Sean O'Sullivan BL and Ahern Rudden Quigley. A spokesperson for Microsoft was not available to comment on the issue. In January, the ICCL jointly filed legal action against Google with the US Federal Trade Commission, claiming that the tech giant's use of 'real time bidding' compromises national security in the US by exposing sensitive details to China's security forces. The filing claimed to cite internal Google discussions to support the complaint, taken under the US's recently-enacted Protecting Americans' Data from Foreign Adversaries Act.
Engadget
14-05-2025
- Business
- Engadget
Appeals court confirms that tracking-based online advertising is illegal in Europe
The Belgian Court of Appeal ruled today that the Transparency and Consent Framework (TCF) currently used as the foundation for most online advertising is illegal in the EU. This decision upholds the findings of the Belgian Data Protection Authority from 2022 that the technology underpinning online ads violates several principles of the General Data Protection Regulations , an EU digital privacy law that took effect in 2018. Engadget's Daniel Cooper wrote a thorough explainer of the different systems that support the current online advertising ecosystem, which is valuable reading for anybody spending time online. The very simplified version is that advertisers participate in real-time bidding (RTB) to show their content online. Currently, those bids are based on information gathered from tracking individuals' activities online with cookies. The TCF was created by the Interactive Advertising Bureau as a way to standardize how websites ask users for permission to be tracked. The original 2022 decision determined that both the consent collected by the TCF and the data collected in the RTB process were illegal under the GDPR. ADVERTISEMENT Advertisement "Today's court's decision shows that the consent system used by Google, Amazon, X, Microsoft, deceives hundreds of millions of Europeans," said Dr Johnny Ryan, director of Enforce at the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, who has been leading the legal charge against the current approach to ad tech. "The tech industry has sought to hide its vast data breach behind sham consent popups. Tech companies turned the GDPR into a daily nuisance rather than a shield for people." The reaction from IAB Europe, which filed the appeal, seems to mostly be relief that it hasn't been found responsible for the data collected by TCF. "The Market Court has rejected the APD's view that IAB Europe is a joint controller together with TCF participants for their own respective processing of personal data, for instance for the purpose of digital advertising," the organization's statement says. IAB Europe notes that it has already suggested changes to the TCF that better reflect the "limited controllership" and submitted them to the Belgian Data Protection Authority. The group faced fines and was ordered to rebuild its current ad-tech framework as a result of the original decision. We've also reached out to some of the major advertisers that use the RTB technology for comment on the ruling. While this does seem like a big win for privacy advocates and internet users in the EU, it's unclear exactly what the next steps will be for advertisers and for ad tech systems. Most likely, regulators will oversee changes the IAB Europe makes to the TCF, so consent pop-ups may not yet be a thing of the past.
The Irish Sun
22-04-2025
- Politics
- The Irish Sun
‘Parents are worried' – New warning over ‘toxic' social media algorithms & bill to stop ‘concerning' children's feeds
SOCIAL media companies would be banned from using 'toxic' algorithms on children under the age of 18 as part of a new bill aimed at protecting the mental health of young people. Platforms such as Advertisement 2 People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy believes toxic content online is leading to an epidemic of mental health issues Credit: Alamy 2 Social media companies would be banned from using 'toxic' algorithms on children under the new bill Credit: Getty Images - Getty This can lead to a situation where someone who has clicked a video about dangerous material such as self harm, extremism or porn being bombarded with similar content on their People Before Profit have launched a new bill calling on social media companies to not use these recommender algorithms for users under the age of 18. The Online Safety (Recommender Algorithms) Bill 2025 would rule that video platforms must People Before Profit TD Advertisement READ MORE IRISH NEWS He said: 'Toxic social media content is driving an epidemic of 'Parents are worried about the impact of toxic social media content on their children and women, people of colour and LGBTQ+ people are put at risk by the role of recommender algorithms in spreading misogyny, racism, homophobia and transphobia. 'Three-quarters of the public believe that there should be stronger regulation of social media algorithms. 'Last year Coimisiun na Meain's draft Online Safety Code included a recommendation to turn off recommender algorithms by default. Advertisement MOST READ IN THE IRISH SUN Latest 'However, this was scrapped following lobbying by the big tech companies whose profits depend on keeping people scrolling for longer so they can sell them advertising.' The bill is being backed by the Irish Council for Civil Liberties who have raised concerns about the type of content pushed towards children by these algorithms. The Council's Dr Johnny Ryan said: 'All parties should be gravely concerned by social media recommender algorithms. 'They push self-harm and suicide in to children's social feeds, and artificially amplify extremism and political polarisation'. Advertisement 'WHY HAS THIS BEEN ALLOWED?' Niamh McDonald, from the Hope and Courage Collective, told the press conference that people's real lives are "affected by what plays out online". She continued: "Right now social media and video platforms recommend illegal, hateful and violent content for people to see. "It is a business model that prioritises emotionally manipulative content through algorithms that drive sharing and engagement. "This distorts what people believe to be true, manipulates emotions and heightens tensions, and in cases breaks laws.' Advertisement Ruth Coppinger concluded: "Why has this been allowed happen? Why has the manosphere been allowed operate unchecked with such dangerous consequences for girls, women and LGBTQ people? "Governments have been in thrall to the social media giants who profit from the manosphere."
BreakingNews.ie
22-04-2025
- Politics
- BreakingNews.ie
Government urged to support bill forcing social media firms to turn off 'addictive' algorithms for children
The Irish Council of Civil Liberties is calling on politicians to support a new bill which would force social media companies to turn off their 'addictive' recommender algorithms for children. Last year a study from Dublin City University's Anti-Bullying Centre showed that the recommender algorithms used by social media platforms are rapidly amplifying misogynistic and male supremacist content. Advertisement The study tracked, recorded and coded the content recommended to ten experimental or 'sockpuppet' accounts on ten blank smartphones - five on YouTube Shorts and five on TikTok. The researchers found that all of the male-identified accounts were fed masculinist, anti-feminist and other extremist content, irrespective of whether they sought out general or male supremacist-related content, and that they all received this content within the first 23 minutes of the experiment. A new bill being put forward by People Before Profit is advocating for a situation where social media companies would have to automatically turn off their 'recommender' algorithms for children. The bill also states that any algorithms based on profiling or sensitive personal data should have to be actively turned on by adult users. Advertisement Senior fellow at the Irish Council of Civil Liberties, Dr Johnny Ryan, told Newstalk Breakfast that he would urge every political party to row behind this bill. 'These systems are dangerous, Meta, YouTube, Instagram, X, TikTok, you name it. 'Each of them has a system that analyses how a child responds to everything that they see and then uses that insight to push into that child's feed things that will addict them. 'For too often, what this results in is a personalised diet of self-loathing, self-harm, and suicide, into the social feed of a child. Advertisement As we know, for adults, this also delivers the perfect drop of poison into each person's ear.' Dr Ryan said that Facebook whistleblowers have indicated that internal studies at Meta showed that 64% of individuals who joined extremist groups on the platform did so arising out of recommendation tools on Facebook. 'The good news is, although Government doesn't seem to share this view, when we polled people across Ireland last year in January with Uplift, we found that 82 per cent of the Irish public supports a binding rule to switch [algorithms] off. 'It's exactly about engagement – the longer you spend glued to your screen, the more space there is for ads, which they can then sell to you or at you and that's what makes the money. Advertisement 'The problem for them is, I don't think anyone really believes what these companies say anymore.' Dr Ryan said that while GDPR technically prohibits personalised data being used by these algorithms, the regulations are not enforced on large tech companies. Business Clare teenager taking pet sector by storm with rab... Read More He believes that that with re election of Donald Trump in the States it is the time for the EU to step up. 'Trump is now in charge, and he has his fingers on the scales for all of these companies. 'So, across Europe, as we wrote in the Guardian last week, Europe now faces the likelihood, I think, of an intional algorithmic assault to boost authoritarians into power. 'We've allowed a situation where Trump is able to hold the hidden levers of Europe's internal political debate, and that is wrong.'
