Facebook In Trouble As Case Heads To EU Court
Digital Marketing News;
A high-profile class action case against Facebook has been referred to The European Court of Justice.
Max Schrems, an Austrian student, launched the suit against Facebook back in 2014, accusing the company of having an “invalid privacy policy” and illegally processing user data.
The case was opened by Schrems on behalf of 25,000 other people, and has worked its way up the Austrian legal system before reaching the European court.
He has also called for the court to be “consumer friendly”, and not force all 25,000 claims to be made separately in thousands of courts across the country.
Facebook has responded to the dispute by saying that the claims “have twice been rejected on the grounds that they cannot proceed as ‘class action’ on behalf of other consumers”.
Previously, following a complaint from Schrems, the European court ruled against a deal that allowed data transfer between the US and Europe, as European users were not adequately protected from US spies, following Edward Snowden’s reveal of confidential NSA information.
Data released by Global Web Index has shown that half of all internet users across the world visit Amazon at least once a month.
According to the report, around 90% of internet users say that they visit an online retail shop on a monthly basis, whilst 80% say that they then go on to buy an item online in the same period.
Success for Amazon can be seen in the data from India, where it is reported that 9 out 10 users there are going to the site, in comparison to 8 out of 10 people in the US and the UK.
Smartphone adoption is growing in India though, meaning that Amazon will have to invest in the mobile market in order to keep up with local competition.
Ecommerce in France is seeing a boost, as it has grown 13% in just the first half of 2016.
The first six months of this year generated around 35 billion Euros in sales for the French ecommerce market, according to data released by Fevad.
It reports that the growth since last year is due to the ever increasing number of users buying on smartphones, as well as the rise in the number of online marketplaces.
The number of ecommerce sites in France rose by 13% from the same period last year, reaching 189,000, and is expected to hit 200,000 before the end of Q3.
After mobile ecommerce sales rose 38% during the second quarter, Marc Lolivier, managing director of Fevad, said that at the current rate “the annual ecommerce turnover will pass the 70 billion Euros mark”.
Baidu is set to launch a support scheme in Brazil.
Designed to assist start-up companies in the country, the Chinese search company will use the programme to continue its expansion into South America.
Using the scheme, Brazilian start-ups will be able to drive traffic to their sites by using Baidu’s experience and international connections.
Currently, companies are applying for a place on the scheme in the hope of being chosen, after which Baidu will take a 10% stake in the business in return for the support.
The move takes Baidu a step closer to widespread expansion in a country that is expected to see 43 million users online within three years.
And finally, the payment service Alipay is going to start charging users.
The services producer, Alibaba, will charge 0.1% every time transfers are made from Alipay to personal bank accounts.
However, the planned introduction of the charges on the 12th October 2016 have not gone down well with users.
Commenters on the Sina Tech article announcing the changes were mostly negative, with the most liked comment saying “I don’t understand”, adding that it was disappointing that Alipay suddenly “wants to charge fees”.