Judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union on the Applicability of Personal Data Protection Rules to Competition Law was announced
In its judgment of July 4, 2023 (Decision), the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has ruled that the national competition authorities may rely on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in their investigation in respect of abuse of dominant position.
In the appeal before the Higher Regional Court of Düsseldorf (the Court) concerning the decision of the German Competition Authority (Bundeskartellamt) which prohibited the processing of user data via merging on Meta's (formerly Facebook) social network without the consent of the users, the Court sought the CJEU's opinion on how to interpret certain provisions of the GDPR and whether national competition authorities may take the GDPR into account when investigating competition law infringements.
Under the preliminary ruling procedure initiated by the Court, the CJEU concluded that in the context of the examination of an abuse of a dominant position by an undertaking, competition authorities can take rules other than those relating to competition law into consideration, such as the data protection rules.
However, the CJEU concluded that competition authorities may exercise their powers only for the purpose of finding infringements of competition law, without taking over the roles of data protection authorities, and must cooperate with other authorities in the performance of their duties. In this context, where competition authorities deem necessary to determine whether an undertaking's conduct complies with the GDPR, they must determine whether such conduct or similar conduct has already been the subject of a decision by the competent supervisory authority or the CJEU.
Furthermore, the CJEU found the fact that the operator of an online social network, as controller, holds a dominant position on the market for social networks does not, as such, prevent the users of that social network from validly giving their consent. Nevertheless, the CJEU has emphasized that the dominant position in the market for social networks is an important factor in assessing the validity of user consent and that the burden of proof in this respect lies with the service provider.
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