In its judgment of 29 March 2021, No. 2631, the Italian Council of State noted that “the capitalisation of personal data, which in the present case takes place unknowingly […], is the result of the intervention of companies through the provision of the data – and the profiling of the user – for commercial purposes”.
The same principle, although not expressly mentioned in the related decision, served as a background to the notorious Euro 390 million sanction imposed by the Irish Data Protection Authority on Meta – owner of, among other things, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp – on 5 January 2023.
This is precisely the reason why today Meta is currently subject to an investigation of the Milan Public Prosecutor’s Office (acting on behalf of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office – EPPO), which draws from the above-mentioned theory at takes it to its extreme consequences, going so far as to affirm that the transaction between the user and the platform is a genuine commercial transaction to which value added tax should apply.
Source: mailchi.mp
