{"id":3108,"date":"2025-10-05T06:57:26","date_gmt":"2025-10-05T06:57:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/2025\/10\/05\/ico-imgurs-uk-decision-wont-prevent-regulatory-fine\/"},"modified":"2025-10-05T06:57:26","modified_gmt":"2025-10-05T06:57:26","slug":"ico-imgurs-uk-decision-wont-prevent-regulatory-fine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/2025\/10\/05\/ico-imgurs-uk-decision-wont-prevent-regulatory-fine\/","title":{"rendered":"ICO: Imgur\u2019s UK Decision Won\u2019t Prevent Regulatory Fine"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/localimages\/ea721ff9-8ba4-4d88-b386-57e9e1606077.jpg?width=64&#038;height=64&#038;mode=crop&#038;scale=both&#038;format=webp\" alt=\"Photo of Phil Muncaster\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"cphContent_pnlArticleBody\" data-layout-id=\"2\" data-edit-folder-name=\"text\" data-index=\"0\">\n<p>The UK\u2019s data protection watchdog has clarified that even companies which cease to offer their services within the country can still be subject to regulatory scrutiny for prior infringements.<\/p>\n<p>The Information Commissioner\u2019s Office issued a brief statement following the decision of image-sharing platform Imgur to block its website in the UK yesterday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cImgur\u2019s decision to restrict access in the UK is a commercial decision taken by the company,\u201d it stated.<\/p>\n<p>A statement on the Imgur site now reads: \u201cFrom September 30, 2025, access to Imgur from the United Kingdom is no longer available. UK users will not be able to log in, view content, or upload images. Imgur content embedded on third-party sites will not display for UK users.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Read more on ICO investigations: UK ICO Fires GDPR \u201cWarning Shot\u201d Over Use of Children\u2019s Data<\/em><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s still unclear whether the decision was influenced by the ICO\u2019s investigation into Imgur, TikTok and Reddit, which the regulator announced in March.<\/p>\n<p>The ICO had expressed concerns over the way these sites use children\u2019s personal information, with its own analysis\u00a0claiming that Imgur:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Did not ask users to state their age when signing up<\/li>\n<li>Did not use any techniques to estimate or verify users\u2019 ages during account setup<\/li>\n<li>Did not ensure children\u2019s profiles are high privacy by default<\/li>\n<li>Did show adverts to children, including targeted ads based on age and location<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Tim Capel, ICO interim executive director \u2013\u00a0regulatory supervision, revealed that the privacy watchdog issued a notice of intent to fine Imgur parent company MediaLab on September 10.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur findings are provisional and the ICO will carefully consider any representations from MediaLab before taking a final decision whether to issue a monetary penalty,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have been clear that exiting the UK does not allow an organization to avoid responsibility for any prior infringement of data protection law, and our investigation remains ongoing.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Following the Children\u2019s Code<\/h2>\n<p>The penalty was issued in line with the requirements of the ICO\u2019s \u201cChildren\u2019s code\u201d \u2013 a data protection code of practice for online service providers whose services are likely to be accessed by children.<\/p>\n<p>Known officially as the Age Appropriate Design Code, it is designed to help these businesses understand what they need to do to comply with the relevant sections of the UK GDPR.<\/p>\n<p>Other MediaLab offerings such as the Kik messaging app are still available in the UK and are compliant with the Online Safety Act;\u00a0another law with major implications for how social media companies handle children\u2019s data. This hints\u00a0that the Imgur decision was indeed made for commercial reasons.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The UK\u2019s data protection watchdog has clarified that even companies which cease to offer their services within the country can still be subject to regulatory scrutiny for prior infringements. The Information Commissioner\u2019s Office issued a brief statement following the decision of image-sharing platform Imgur to block its website in the UK yesterday. \u201cImgur\u2019s decision to<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3109,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"thumbnail":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"medium_large":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"large":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"1536x1536":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"2048x2048":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"morenews-featured":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"morenews-large":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"morenews-medium":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8.jpg",300,300,false],"crawlomatic_preview_image":["http:\/\/ft365.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/3108-403cc7c2-6ab0-4f71-bdb0-71821e07b4a8-146x146.jpg",146,146,true]},"author_info":{"display_name":"henry","author_link":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/author\/henry\/"},"category_info":"<a href=\"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/category\/uncategorized\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Uncategorized<\/a>","tag_info":"Uncategorized","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ft365.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}