On May 31, 2024, Spain’s data-protection authority ordered Meta Platforms Ireland to suspend the planned launch in Spain of two election-information features for Facebook and Instagram, and to stop collecting and processing data connected with them. The AEPD described the action as an urgent, temporary precautionary measure—not a permanent ban on Meta’s services or a final ruling that the company violated the GDPR.
What Spain ordered Meta to stop
The Agencia Española de Protección de Datos (AEPD), Spain’s data-protection authority, directed Meta Platforms Ireland Limited to suspend implementation in Spain of two planned features: Election Day Information (EDI) and Voter Information Unit (VIU). It also ordered Meta to suspend the collection and processing of personal data associated with the features.
The planned features were intended to provide election information to Facebook and Instagram users ahead of the June 2024 European Parliament election. The order did not shut down Facebook or Instagram in Spain, and it did not prohibit every form of election-related activity on Meta’s platforms. Nor does the available official account establish that these specific features were political-advertising or voter-targeting products.
What EDI and VIU were supposed to do—and what data was at issue
The AEPD identified the features’ public-facing purpose as providing election information. Its announcement does not give a detailed interface description, so the precise screens, prompts, or notification flow should not be assumed. The privacy dispute concerned the data operation behind the service as well as its civic purpose.
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The authority said the planned processing included:
- Usernames
- IP addresses
- Age and gender
- Information about how users interacted with the election features
Interaction data can reveal more than whether a service was available: it may record how people engaged with election-related material. That does not by itself prove that political opinions were collected or inferred. The AEPD’s concern was that the volume, combination, retention, or onward use of data could contribute to more intrusive profiling.
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Why the AEPD intervened
The AEPD said the proposed processing raised concerns about GDPR principles of lawfulness, data minimization, and storage limitation. It also warned that the features could increase the amount and detail of information held about users, enable more exhaustive profiling, and involve transfers of personal data to third parties—including parties whose identities or purposes were not specified in the authority’s account.
The regulatory question was not simply whether election information is useful. Platforms can distribute civic information at scale, but the AEPD scrutinized whether the associated collection and retention of user information were justified and limited to what that purpose required. Public availability of election dates or voting information would not, on its own, make records of users’ interactions public or remove GDPR obligations.
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Age, gender, IP addresses, and interaction records are not automatically political-opinion data. The concern is whether such information, especially in combination with other data or analytical methods, could be used to infer political characteristics. The AEPD connected its concerns to political profiling, microtargeting, artificial intelligence, and the risks of manipulation and disinformation. It also referred to its Circular 1/2019, which limits processing of freely expressed political opinions and says other data should not be used to infer ideology through big-data or AI techniques. This is a risk rationale, not evidence that Meta had already inferred users’ political opinions through EDI or VIU.
Why the measure was temporary, not a final GDPR judgment
The AEPD relied on Article 66(1) of the GDPR, which permits a supervisory authority to adopt urgent provisional measures in exceptional circumstances when immediate action is needed to protect data subjects’ rights and freedoms. The authority said its measure could last for no more than three months. It framed intervention as necessary because ordinary proceedings might not protect users in time once processing began during an imminent election period.
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That legal status matters. The AEPD said the planned processing appeared contrary to GDPR principles, but a precautionary measure is an interim intervention, not a comprehensive final merits decision. The order was geographically limited to Spain and temporary; it should not be described as proof that Meta illegally harvested voters’ data or as a permanent prohibition.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Meta’s response
Meta said the tools were designed to respect users’ privacy and comply with the GDPR, indicating that it disagreed with the AEPD’s assessment. Reuters reported the company’s position; the existence of the order does not itself establish that Meta’s defense was disproved.
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1Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems2Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches3Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsHow the Spanish action fit into wider European scrutiny
Spain was not the only country examining the planned features. The AEPD said Meta intended to deploy them to eligible users across the European Union, except in Italy, where the Italian data-protection authority already had an ongoing procedure concerning the matter. The available account does not establish that other EU countries blocked the tools.
The AEPD also noted that the European Commission had opened a separate Digital Services Act (DSA) procedure against Meta in late April 2024. That Commission investigation included broader issues involving disinformation, visibility of political content, and election-monitoring tools. It was distinct from Spain’s data-protection action: the AEPD used GDPR emergency powers to address data-processing risks and suspend the planned features in Spain, while the Commission’s DSA procedure examined broader platform and election-integrity concerns.
What the order does—and does not—establish about the election
Issued on May 31, 2024, shortly before the European Parliament election held across EU member states in June, the order was designed to cover the election period and its immediate aftermath. The available accounts do not establish that it changed turnout, voter behavior, or election results, or that the features had already collected user data before the order.
They also do not establish whether Meta later redesigned or deployed the features in Spain, whether the AEPD issued a final merits decision, or how the Italian proceeding concluded. Those outcomes should not be inferred from the temporary order alone.
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The dispute highlights a recurring challenge for election platforms: a feature can have a civic-information purpose while also generating behavioral records about people who encounter or use it. The AEPD’s intervention focused on whether the data collection, retention, and possible onward use were lawful and proportionate—not on a finding that election information itself should be unavailable on social media.
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