The Dresden Larger Regional Court docket this week delivered legally binding judgments in opposition to Meta Platforms Eire Restricted, ordering the corporate to pay 4 Saxon Instagram and Fb customers €1,500 every in damages for illegally amassing private knowledge throughout numerous third-party web sites and apps. The February 3, 2026, selections mark the primary closing rulings of their sort in Germany. Meta can not enchantment to the Federal Court docket of Justice.

In accordance with courtroom paperwork in case 4 U 292/25, the 4th Civil Senate prohibited Meta from amassing knowledge concerning the plaintiffs on third-party websites and apps with speedy impact. The rulings reference violations of German character rights together with the Common Knowledge Safety Regulation and related selections from the European Court docket of Justice.

The courtroom’s exclusion of revision to the Federal Court docket of Justice represents a very extreme final result for Meta’s authorized place. The Dresden panel decided the authorized state of affairs to be so clear that no additional appellate evaluation is warranted. Whereas German district courts have issued contradictory rulings – the Dresden Larger Regional Court docket reversed the Leipzig District Court docket’s judgment favoring Meta – no disagreement exists amongst German appellate courts relating to the illegality of Meta’s knowledge assortment practices via Enterprise Instruments.

Technical infrastructure underneath scrutiny

Meta’s Enterprise Instruments infrastructure operates via applied sciences together with Meta Pixel, Conversions API, App Occasions through Fb SDK, Offline Conversions, and App Occasions API. In accordance with the courtroom’s evaluation of Meta’s utilization phrases, these instruments allow third-party firms to gather private knowledge from on-line and offline buyer interactions. The information flows to Meta’s servers the place it undergoes processing for numerous functions, together with however not restricted to personalised promoting.

The system collects contact data – e mail addresses, telephone numbers, names, dates of delivery, gender, location, and exterior advertiser IDs. Occasion knowledge captured consists of web site URLs, go to timestamps, referrer data, button clicks, and complete interplay documentation that Meta phrases “Occasions.” Cellular app monitoring encompasses app names, go to instances, button interactions, and detailed behavioral information.

Enterprise Instruments utilization phrases specify that Meta can course of occasion knowledge for measurement options, analytics companies, promoting focusing on, supply of economic messages, and enchancment of promoting supply and personalization. The courtroom discovered Meta makes use of occasion knowledge to personalize options and content material proven to customers each inside and outdoors Meta merchandise, and for analysis, improvement, and integrity functions throughout Meta’s platform ecosystem.

Knowledge processing mechanisms

In accordance with courtroom findings, third-party firms transmit knowledge to Meta via Enterprise Instruments embedded on their web sites, servers, or apps. The applied sciences function topic to Meta’s utilization phrases and knowledge processing situations. Firms implementing these instruments face obligations underneath joint duty provisions outlined in Article 26 GDPR dietary supplements.

Meta’s utilization phrases reveal that contact data undergoes hashing earlier than transmission, utilizing SHA-256 cryptographic algorithms prescribed by Meta. The corporate maintains the potential to reverse this encryption via matching procedures that align hashed knowledge with its inside person identification programs. Following matching processes, contact data undergoes deletion, although occasion knowledge mixed with matched person IDs stays saved and accessible for Meta’s designated functions.

The courtroom decided that even when customers refuse cookies on third-party websites, knowledge transmission to Meta can nonetheless happen. Implementation errors by third-party firms contribute to unauthorized knowledge flows, although Meta maintains it has deployed filtering programs to forestall receipt of prohibited data classes together with well being knowledge, monetary data, and knowledge regarding youngsters underneath 13.

Customers who refuse to allow “Meta Cookies in different apps and on different web sites” via platform settings reportedly obtain Meta’s assurance that their particular person cookie data won’t be used for related promoting. Nevertheless, the corporate acknowledges continued receipt of details about person actions from apps and web sites, which it claims to make use of for measurements and promoting system enhancements although not linked to particular person accounts.

Enforcement implications

The courtroom valued damages at €1,500 per affected person, positioning the award inside the mid-range of compensation quantities being decided throughout German courts. Leipzig Regional Court awarded €5,000 in the same case determined in July 2025, whereas Munich Higher Regional Court granted €750 in a December 2025 ruling that permitted revision to the Federal Court docket.

Berlin regulation agency BK Baumeister & Kollegen represents greater than 7,000 plaintiffs with authorized expense insurance coverage protection in proceedings earlier than German courts. In accordance with legal professional Max Baumeister, fewer than half of those circumstances have reached first-instance selections, with roughly 60 % favoring plaintiffs and 40 % favoring Meta. Courts in Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt had beforehand dominated persistently for Meta, with Leipzig District Court docket offering a notable exception earlier than the Dresden appellate reversal.

Baumeister indicated that Saxon district courts will possible modify their practices following the Dresden Larger Regional Court docket selections. Throughout oral arguments in early December 2025, the courtroom subjected Meta’s attorneys to intensive questioning relating to knowledge processing justifications and technical implementations.

The exclusion of revision creates restricted choices for Meta to problem the Dresden selections. Whereas Meta may theoretically try a non-admission criticism to the Federal Court docket of Justice, success seems unlikely. The courtroom set dispute worth at €9,000, effectively beneath the everyday €20,001 minimal threshold for such proceedings. Although the Federal Court docket of Justice maintains discretion in figuring out criticism worth independently of decrease courtroom valuations, it typically follows established dispute values, significantly when events accepted these quantities throughout prior proceedings.

Regulatory context

The Dresden rulings arrive amid intensifying European enforcement in opposition to Meta’s knowledge practices. Austria’s Supreme Court docket delivered a closing judgment in November 2025 ordering Meta to supply comprehensive access to all personal datacollected from privateness advocate Max Schrems, together with detailed details about knowledge sources, recipients, and processing functions. The ruling rejected Meta’s commerce secret arguments and established that Article 15 GDPR creates enforceable rights to detailed details about each facet of information processing.

Spanish authorities ordered Meta to pay €479 million in November 2025 for unfair competitors violations stemming from unlawful knowledge processing that gave the platform aggressive benefits Spanish digital publishers couldn’t replicate. The Madrid courtroom discovered Meta collected data not solely from its personal platforms however from different web pages customers visited, creating illegal aggressive benefits in behavioral promoting markets.

Analysis disclosed in June 2025 revealed Meta had applied covert Android tracking via localhost port connections, permitting Fb and Instagram apps to hyperlink shopping historical past with person identities whereas bypassing privateness protections together with Incognito Mode and Android permission controls. Meta discontinued the apply following tutorial researchers’ public disclosure.

Platform response

Meta declined to supply particular responses to questions on the way it has modified Enterprise Instruments operations following the Austrian Supreme Court docket determination or whether or not it plans to regulate the instruments inside the European Financial Space or Germany particularly. In a quick assertion, the corporate indicated disagreement with the Dresden selections and maintained its place that it complies with all relevant legal guidelines. Meta indicated it could contemplate additional authorized steps with out specifying explicit actions.

The corporate faces structural challenges in defending its Enterprise Instruments infrastructure throughout a number of jurisdictions. Enterprise Instruments generate substantial promoting income via knowledge assortment and processing that courts have discovered violates GDPR necessities for lawful processing bases, knowledge minimization, storage limitations, and transparency.

In accordance with Meta’s personal utilization documentation, the corporate processes Enterprise Instruments knowledge for functions extending past particular person third-party advertiser wants, together with aggregation with different knowledge sources for promoting supply enhancements, personalization of Meta product options, and analysis and improvement actions. Courts have discovered this complete knowledge processing can’t be justified via person consent obtained on third-party web sites, as such consent covers solely the web site operator’s processing functions, not Meta’s impartial industrial targets.

The Dresden courtroom grounded its determination in violations of common character rights underneath German civil regulation together with GDPR provisions. Meta bears duty as a controller underneath Article 4(7) GDPR for knowledge processing via Enterprise Instruments, regardless of the involvement of third-party web site operators who additionally deploy these applied sciences.

In accordance with the courtroom’s evaluation, Meta qualifies as a joint controller with web site operators underneath Article 26 GDPR for knowledge assortment occurring on third-party websites. The corporate offers Enterprise Instruments to third-party companies, enabling Meta to obtain substantial knowledge volumes about customers’ on-line actions for its personal industrial functions. This association creates joint duty for the preliminary knowledge assortment part, although Meta stays independently answerable for subsequent processing by itself servers.

The courtroom rejected Meta’s argument that it processes knowledge merely as a processor on behalf of third-party advertisers. Enterprise Instruments utilization phrases reveal Meta pursues its personal processing functions together with promoting optimization throughout its platform ecosystem, characteristic personalization, and analysis actions extending past particular person advertiser targets. These impartial industrial functions set up Meta’s standing as a controller quite than a processor for the collected knowledge.

Meta claimed it processes Enterprise Instruments knowledge based mostly on official pursuits underneath Article 6(1)(f) GDPR for safety and integrity functions. The courtroom discovered this justification inadequate to cowl the complete scope of information processing documented in Meta’s personal utilization phrases and privateness insurance policies. Even assuming official safety pursuits, the intensive knowledge aggregation and indefinite retention durations failed proportionality necessities underneath GDPR Article 5(1)(c) and (e).

The courtroom discovered Meta can not depend on person consent as a authorized foundation for Enterprise Instruments knowledge processing. Customers who register for Instagram or Fb comply with platform utilization phrases that reference knowledge insurance policies, however these agreements don’t embody consent for knowledge assortment occurring on fully separate third-party web sites and apps outdoors Meta’s direct management.

When customers go to third-party web sites outfitted with Enterprise Instruments, any consent they supply via cookie banners or privateness notices covers solely the web site operator’s knowledge processing functions. Such consent doesn’t prolong to Meta’s separate industrial targets together with cross-site monitoring, profile aggregation, and promoting optimization throughout Meta’s platform ecosystem. The European Court docket of Justice established in its July 29, 2019, Trend ID ruling that every joint controller should acquire separate consent for its personal processing functions.

Meta’s privateness settings inside Instagram and Fb platforms permit customers to manage sure elements of promoting personalization, however the courtroom discovered these settings don’t present ample mechanisms for customers to consent to or refuse Enterprise Instruments knowledge assortment occurring earlier than they even entry Meta’s platforms. The temporal and technical separation between third-party web site visits and Meta platform utilization prevents significant consent flows.

The courtroom emphasised that hashing contact data earlier than transmission doesn’t eradicate the non-public knowledge character of the knowledge or cut back consent necessities. Meta prescribes the particular hashing methodology (SHA-256) to third-party implementers exactly as a result of the corporate maintains technical functionality to reverse the hashing via matching with its personal person database. The hashed knowledge retains its hyperlink to identifiable people all through the processing chain.

Knowledge minimization violations

Article 5(1)(c) GDPR requires that non-public knowledge be ample, related, and restricted to what’s obligatory for processing functions. The courtroom discovered Meta’s Enterprise Instruments knowledge assortment systematically violates this precept via indiscriminate aggregation of person habits throughout limitless web sites and apps with out temporal or categorical restrictions.

In accordance with courtroom evaluation, Meta collects occasion knowledge documenting each person interplay on outfitted third-party websites – web page views, button clicks, type submissions, purchases, and behavioral patterns. This complete surveillance extends throughout various web site classes together with information media, e-commerce, journey reserving, well being data, and monetary companies. The aggregated knowledge creates detailed profiles of customers’ pursuits, political beliefs, well being considerations, monetary circumstances, and private relationships.

The European Court docket of Justice addressed knowledge minimization necessities in its October 4, 2024, Schrems II determination, establishing that controllers can not course of all private knowledge obtained about customers with out temporal limits or distinction by knowledge sort, even when customers consent to personalised promoting. The precept of information minimization applies whatever the authorized foundation claimed for processing. Controllers should display which particular knowledge classes are obligatory for outlined processing functions and retain knowledge just for durations justified by these functions.

Meta’s Enterprise Instruments function on a mannequin of maximal knowledge assortment topic solely to filtering for clearly prohibited classes like Social Safety numbers. The courtroom discovered this strategy inverts the information minimization precept by amassing first and evaluating necessity afterward, if in any respect. Meta offered no proof throughout proceedings demonstrating which particular knowledge factors from Enterprise Instruments are obligatory for acknowledged functions like safety monitoring or promoting effectiveness measurement.

Storage durations compound the minimization violations. Meta’s utilization phrases specify occasion knowledge could also be saved for as much as two years, whereas the corporate acknowledged throughout proceedings that safety and integrity processes require indefinite retention durations that can’t be exactly specified attributable to “complexity and nuances.” The courtroom discovered these indefinite retention justifications incompatible with Article 5(1)(e) GDPR, which requires storage limitation to durations obligatory for processing functions.

Particular class knowledge processing

The courtroom addressed Meta’s dealing with of particular class private knowledge underneath Article 9(1) GDPR, which offers enhanced safety for data revealing racial or ethnic origin, political views, spiritual beliefs, commerce union membership, genetic knowledge, biometric knowledge, well being knowledge, intercourse life, or sexual orientation.

Enterprise Instruments don’t technically distinguish between peculiar private knowledge and particular class knowledge throughout assortment and transmission processes. In accordance with courtroom findings, the automated knowledge flows seize no matter data customers work together with on outfitted web sites, making particular class knowledge processing inevitable when customers go to well being data websites, political advocacy platforms, spiritual organizations, or LGBTQ+ assets.

Meta prohibited third-party advertisers from deliberately transmitting particular class knowledge via Enterprise Instruments utilization phrases. Nevertheless, the courtroom discovered this contractual prohibition inadequate to forestall precise processing of such knowledge. Meta can not management what content material customers entry on third-party websites or what data these websites affiliate with person interactions. The corporate acknowledged its filtering programs try and establish and block apparent particular class knowledge, however offered no proof these programs reliably forestall all such knowledge from coming into its processing programs.

The European Court docket of Justice addressed this problem in its July 4, 2023, determination, discovering that when automated processing programs don’t distinguish between peculiar and particular class knowledge throughout assortment, the complete processing operation should be evaluated as processing of particular classes. Article 9(1) GDPR prohibits such processing absent particular exceptions underneath Article 9(2), none of which Meta efficiently invoked.

The courtroom rejected Meta’s argument that it processes particular class knowledge solely when customers make such data “manifestly public” underneath Article 9(2)(e) GDPR. That exception applies when people intentionally disclose delicate data publicly, not once they privately browse well being data or go to web sites addressing delicate subjects. The mere act of visiting an internet site doesn’t represent making one’s well being situations, sexual orientation, or political beliefs manifestly public within the authorized sense required by the exception.

Market implications

Roughly 10,000 claims from German web customers in opposition to Meta Platforms are at the moment pending in German courts for knowledge safety violations. The Dresden selections establishing legally binding precedent with out chance of Federal Court docket of Justice evaluation might speed up submitting of further claims and affect outcomes in pending circumstances.

Authorized expense insurance coverage suppliers which have declined protection for Meta claims citing unsure authorized outcomes might face stress to rethink their positions following institution of clear appellate precedent in Saxony. The Dresden courtroom’s discovering that the authorized state of affairs is sufficiently clear to exclude revision suggests diminished litigation danger for potential plaintiffs.

For advertising professionals, the rulings underscore rising regulatory scrutiny of third-party monitoring applied sciences. Millions of websites currently implement Meta Pixel and different Enterprise Instruments for promoting effectiveness measurement and marketing campaign optimization. The Dresden selections counsel present implementations violate European knowledge safety regulation, probably exposing web site operators to compensation claims alongside Meta.

The courtroom indicated that web site operators embedding Meta’s monitoring instruments might share legal responsibility for GDPR violations. Joint duty provisions underneath Article 26 require web site operators and Meta to ascertain clear preparations for his or her respective GDPR obligations, together with mechanisms for customers to train their rights. Many present implementations lack such preparations or fail to acquire correct person consent earlier than activating monitoring applied sciences.

Timeline

Abstract

Who: The Dresden Larger Regional Court docket’s 4th Civil Senate dominated in 4 parallel proceedings introduced by Saxon Instagram and Fb customers represented by BK Baumeister & Kollegen in opposition to Meta Platforms Eire Restricted.

What: The courtroom ordered Meta to pay €1,500 per plaintiff for illegally amassing private knowledge via Enterprise Instruments embedded on third-party web sites and apps, prohibited future assortment from these plaintiffs, and excluded Meta’s proper to enchantment to Germany’s Federal Court docket of Justice.

When: The courtroom delivered its selections on February 3, 2026, with oral arguments having occurred in early December 2025. The rulings deal with knowledge assortment practices extending from Might 25, 2018, when GDPR took impact.

The place: The Dresden Larger Regional Court docket issued the rulings in Saxony, Germany, underneath case numbers together with 4 U 292/25. The selections have implications all through the European Financial Space the place Meta operates equivalent Enterprise Instruments infrastructure.

Why: The courtroom discovered Meta’s Enterprise Instruments violate German character rights together with GDPR as a result of the corporate collects, shops, and processes private knowledge from third-party websites with out legitimate authorized justification underneath Article 6 GDPR, fails to reduce knowledge assortment, and processes knowledge in ways in which create complete surveillance of customers’ on-line habits.


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