Threat of fine for Facebook

A German data protection official has threatened multibillionaire Mark Zuckerberg with a €20,000 fine if Facebook does not allow…

A German data protection official has threatened multibillionaire Mark Zuckerberg with a €20,000 fine if Facebook does not allow Germans to have anonymous accounts on the social network.

In letters to the Facebook founder in California, and also to Dublin-based Facebook Ireland Ltd, the data protection commissioner for the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, Thilo Weichert, said the rules violated German law by requiring users to provide their identities.

Under the German Telemedia Act, media services, including Facebook, must offer users the choice of a pseudonym. – (Guardian service)