Statement on EDPB "Pay or Okay" Opinion

The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) has issued a decision that prohibits Meta from using an unlawful consent request to process personal data for advertising in the EU. This decision relates to Meta's 'Pay or Okay' system, which was charging users more than €250 per year for Instagram and Facebook if they did not consent to the use of their personal data. The EDPB's decision requires Meta to provide users with a genuine yes/no option for personalized advertising without the need to pay a fee.

The EDPB considers 'Pay or Okay' to not be 'freely given' consent because it confronts users with a binary choice between consenting to the processing of personal data for behavioral advertising purposes or paying a fee. This model is seen as coercive and does not uphold the 'genuine wishes' of the users, as it significantly shifts consent rates from about 3% to more than 99%, indicating that users are not truly agreeing out of free will.

The EDPB mentioned the possibility of introducing a third option beyond 'Pay or Okay', which includes various ways to monetize a website such as:

• Contextual advertising: Ads based on the content of the website rather than user behavior.
• Product placement: Including products or brands within the content.
• Paid content: Charging users for access to certain content.
• Freemium models: Offering basic content for free, while charging for premium content. The EDPB emphasizes that the GDPR does not limit these other funding methods, even if they may be less profitable than the 'Pay or Okay' model.