Meta Platforms Ireland Ltd v DPC - 10 May 2024

• Judgment Date: 10 May 2024
• Issuer: High Court
• Date: 10 May 2024
• Year: 2024

NO REDACTION REQUIRED

APPROVED[2024] IEHC 264

THE HIGH COURT

2022 339 MCA

IN THE MATTER OF AN APPEAL PURSUANT TO THE DATA PROTECTION

ACT 2018

BETWEEN

META PLATFORMS IRELANDLTD

APPELLANT

AND

DATA PROTECTION COMMISSION

RESPONDENT

JUDGMENT of Mr. Justice Garrett Simons delivered on 10 May 2024

INTRODUCTION

1.This judgment addresses an aspect of the case management o f these proceedings.

In particular, this judgment addresses the optimal sequencing of these

proceedings vis-à-vis proceedings which are currently pending before the Court

of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”). For ease of exposition, the within

2

proceedings will be described by the shorthand “the domestic proceedings”, and

the proceedings before the CJEU will be described as “the EU proceedings”.

2.Both sets of proceedings raise questions of legislative interpretation in relation

to the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679)

(“GDPR”).

3.The parties to the case management application are in broad agreement that the

hearing and determination of at least part of the domestic proceedings must be

deferred to await the outcome of the EU proceedings. The parties are in

disagreement, however, on whether it would be appropriate to direct a modular

trial in respect of such issues, if any, arising in the domestic proceedings as are

not directly affected by the outcome of the EU proceedings. The alternative

course would be to adjourn the domestic proceedings in their entirety pending

the resolution of the EU proceedings. This is the course agitated for by Meta

PlatformsIreland Ltd. The Data Protection Commission submits that the High

Court is obliged under EU law to determine the domestic proceedings

expeditiously and that this is best achieved by a modular trial. Ireland and the

Attorney General, who are parties in relatedjudicialreview proceedings, did not

participate in the case managementapplication.

PROCEDURAL HISTORY

4.The Data Protection Commission (“DPC”) commenced an own-volition inquiry

in relation to certain historical conduct by Meta Platforms Ireland Ltd(“Meta”).

It should be explained that Meta had already ceased the conduct, which

subsequently became the subject of inquiry, prior to the commencement of the

own-volition inquiry. The temporal scope of the own-volition inquiry is limited