The Zhitong Finance App learned that the Australian Federal Court of Justice requested Facebook Israel and Onavo, two subsidiaries of Meta (META.US), each to pay a fine of 10 million Australian dollars on charges of misleading consumers in terms of data usage. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) said on Wednesday that the court declared that the two companies had misled the public in promoting the Onavo Protect app because they did not properly disclose that users' data would be used for purposes other than providing Onavo Protect (virtual private network (VPN)), including Meta's commercial purposes.
The ACCC added that Onavo and Facebook Israel shared users' personal activity data collected by the app in an anonymous and aggregated form with parent company Meta to obtain commercial benefits. The ACCC notes that the information shared with Meta includes users' internet and app activity data, such as records of every app they visit, and the time they use those apps.
The ACCC said that in documents submitted to the court, both Facebook Israel and Onavo agreed that the app store listing stated that the data of Onavo Protect users would only be used to provide Onavo Protect VPN. However, these instructions do not disclose that data collected by Onavo Protect about the online activities of its Australian users is also used for other purposes, including as a “business intelligence tool.”
ACCC Chairman Gina Cas - Gottlieb said: “In the case of the Onavo Protect app, we are concerned that consumers seeking to protect their privacy through a virtual private network are not being clearly informed that they are actually facilitating Meta's commercial interests when they download and use the app.”
According to reports, Judge Wendy Abraham said in a written judgment that Facebook uses Onavo for advertising purposes to collect where, when, and how often users use other smartphone apps and what websites users visit. The Australian court also ordered the company to pay the ACCC $400,000 in legal fees.