Turkey fines Facebook over data breach

By Ferdi Turkten

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey on Thursday fined social media giant Facebook 1.6 million Turkish liras (over $281,000) over a data breach exposing the personal information of hundreds of thousands of users in Turkey.

Facebook exposed the name, gender, birthday, relationship status, educational background, religion, hometown, and location information of nearly 281,000 users, said the Personal Data Protection Authority, a Turkish watchdog agency.

Facebook was fined 1.15 million Turkish liras ($201,865) for the breach, and 450,000 Turkish liras (nearly $79,000) for failing to provide notice of the breach.

This May, the Personal Data Protection Authority fined Facebook 1.65 million Turkish liras ($289,566) over a previous data breach.

This June, the U.S. fined Facebook $5 billion for privacy violations, the largest ever fine levied by the Federal Trade Commission on a tech company.

But critics said the fine amounted to a working expense for the tech giant, which last year drew in nearly $56 billion in revenue.