Home » EU GDPR Quick Guide to GDPR Fines and Sanctions

The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was one of the first privacy laws to compel broad organizational compliance, largely because the cost of non-compliance can be extremely high.

Under the GDPR, national authorities have the ability to levy financial penalties for GDPR infringements. These fines work in addition to or instead of other corrective powers. The largest fines are up to 20 million euros or 4% of global turnover for the most severe violations. However, even less severe infringements can still result in substantial fines that create significant financial and operational pressure for organizations, as well as reputational damage.

Although GDPR compliance is complicated and often costly, it rarely costs more than GDPR penalties. Keep reading to learn more about how GDPR fines work and whether you’re at risk of facing a significant penalty.

What Are the Penalties for GDPR Violations?

The GDPR grants national authorities the power to apply fines of up to 20 million euros or 4% of the previous financial year’s global turnover (whichever is greater) to the worst violations.

Even among so-called lesser violations, the penalties can still be very high and reach 10 million euros or 2% of global turnover (whichever is greater).

A data protection authority is not limited to financial fines. Instead, they might choose to:

• Issue a warning
• Impose a ban on data processing (temporary or permanent)
• Demand the erasure or data
• Suspend data transfers to third countries

Whether or not the action comes with a fine might also be the product of:

• The type of violation
• The severity of the violation
• Mitigation measures
• Preventive measures
• Cooperation
• Certifications
• Data type
• Intentions
• Previous infringements

This is up to the discretion of the data protection authority.

What are the Biggest GDPR Fines So Far?

Under the GDPR, individuals whose personal data has been mishandled have the right to seek compensation for damages. Article 82 specifically establishes that any person who suffers material or non-material damage as a result of a GDPR infringement can claim compensation from the controller or processor responsible.

This provision not only empowers data subjects but also underscores the potential financial consequences for organizations that fail to be compliant.

Examining the biggest GDPR fines so far illustrates how seriously regulators take violations and real-world impact of Article 82.

The examples below show that businesses of any size can face a GDPR violation. After all, it’s up to the national data protection authority to identify and investigate potential infringements, which means the authority is more nimble than the European Commission or another pan-EU body.

Even still, it’s important not to confuse the prevalence of smaller fines with the potential for devastating penalties. The potential for financial ruin grows with the size of the company, and regulators haven’t been shy about adding huge fines for violations.

So far, the biggest GDPR fine to date is €1.2 billion, imposed on Meta (Facebook / Instagram / WhatsApp) by the Irish Data Protection Commission in May 2023.

Other notable fines are:

• – Amazon – 746 million euro (2021)
• – LinkedIn – 310 million euro (2024)
• – Uber – 290 million euro (2024)
• – Tiktok – 530 million euro (2025)

Notice that these companies collect huge amounts of European personal data. It also shows that regulators aren’t afraid of going after big organisations, even if those organisations are important bodies in their own states.

How to Avoid GDPR Fines and Penalties

Avoiding GDPR fines requires each company to (1) understand whether they fall under the umbrella of the regulation and (2) understand their responsibilities.

If your business processes the data of individuals in Europe, then it is very likely that you must comply with the regulation. Should you choose not to comply (in error or wilfully), you are at risk of fines.

For most companies, losing access to a market of over 450 million people is simply out of the question. As a result, compliance is the only way forward.

What Should Your Company Do Next?

Compliance is a fairly complicated process because the GDPR touches every aspect of data processing. It begins before you collect data and carries through to the erasure of it.
While the GDPR isn’t prescriptive, it does provide seven principles that illuminate the path forward.

The seven data protection principles include:

1. Lawfulness, fairness, and transparency
2. Purpose limitation
3. Data minimisation
4. Data accuracy
5. Data storage limits
6. Security, integrity, and confidentiality
7. Accountability

These principles are highlighted in Article 5 of the GDPR.

What does this mean?
It means that you must collect and process data only if you have a legal basis to do so and if you properly inform individuals about how you will do that. The principles also stipulate that you must avoid collecting data that you don’t need or use. It’s also important to ensure that any data that you store is accurate and that you set limits on the amount of time you keep data.

These are all policy endeavours, but there is some investment involved, too.
Security practices are critical when avoiding GDPR fines. The regulation requires that you report data protection breaches to the relevant data protection authorities once the breach moves beyond a certain threshold. At a minimum, you must have proper security practices, secure storage, and only transfer data to third-countries, if the EU has considered these jurisdictions ensure an “adequate level of protection”, or if there are appropriate safeguards in place.

Don’t Forget About the Human Element

The human element of the GDPR is almost forgotten with all the concerns regarding security protections and consent mechanisms. But every element of the GDPR is important, so it is important to ensure that your teams include the right team members and that they are educated to a minimum standard.

First, the regulation requires that anyone who works with personal data needs to understand their role in privacy and protection. Again, the GDPR doesn’t provide specific requirements, so it’s up to each organisation to ensure they meet the requirements. Training can occur through off-the-shelf training courses or through a custom culture change.
But your organisation is not GDPR compliant until the training occurs (and is documented).
The GDPR also requires the nomination of several positions. Two of these are the Data Protection Officer (DPO) and, for companies based outside of Europe, the EU GDPR Representative. These are two distinct positions, and not all companies will need to nominate both.
However, failing to nominate and share the details of your DPO or EU representative could leave you liable to facing fines. So, it is important to understand your obligations early.
If you need a DPO or EU GDPR representative and you don’t have one, then you have violated the GDPR and could face fines.

What are the actionable steps to appoint a Representative ?

To appoint a representative, a business located outside the EU must first confirm that it processes the personal data of EU individuals, either by offering goods or services or by monitoring their behavior.

The representative must be authorised in writing to act on your behalf regarding GDPR compliance and to liaise with both the data protection authorities and data subjects.

The appointment of the representative should be formalised through a written mandate agreement, and the representative’s details should be made public, for example in a company’s privacy notice.

If you decide to appoint us as your GDPR representative, our onboarding process is very simple and quick, and everything can be completed within a few hours. Here are the main steps:

1. We will send the agreement for electronic signature.
2. Once executed, we will send you an email containing:
   a) Your Article 27 Compliance Certificates, which you can download and add wherever needed
   b) Instructions on how to upload your company’s Record of Processing Activities (ROPA) to the secure third-party platform we use.

Still not sure if you need to appoint a representative? Feel free to take our assessment test here, to fill out our registration form here or to simply send us an email to info@edpo.com.