The Irish Data Protection Commission that overseas Meta operations in the EU alleged that the company infringed the bloc’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) when it continued to send the personal data of European citizens to the U.S despite the 2020 European court ruling.

Regulators alleged Meta failed to comply with a 2020 decision by the EU’s Supreme Court based on Facebook’s data sent to the U.S. not being protected enough from U.S. spy agencies.

The ruling applies only to Facebook and not to Instagram and WhatsApp, which are also owned by Meta.

The report added the case comes from U.S. policies that grant intelligence agencies the ability to intercept communications from abroad, including digital correspondence.

According to the source, Meta said it would appeal the decision, which would start a potentially lengthy legal process.

Through a statement, Meta claimed it was being unfairly singled out for information-sharing practices used by thousands of companies.

“We are appealing these decisions and will immediately seek a stay with the courts who can pause the implementation deadlines, given the harm that these orders would cause, including to the millions of people who use Facebook every day,” Nick Clegg, Meta president of global affairs, and Jennifer Newstead, chief legal officer at the company, said in a blog post on Monday.

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