Google and Amazon fined 135M over misuse of cookies by French data watchdog

France’s data protection regulator, the Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés or CNIL, has fined Google and Amazon a total of €135 million (around $163 million) between them for violating the country’s data protection laws. Google was fined a total of €100 million (around $121 million), while Amazon was fined €35 million (around $42 million).

In both cases, CNIL’s complaints were similar. It said that in the past, when users visited either company’s French website, cookies — including some used for advertising — were placed on their devices without prior consent. Although both have since updated their websites to require a user’s consent before placing cookies, the regulator criticized their cookie information banners...

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