On 4 May 2023, the European Court of Justice (CJEU) delivered its highly anticipated judgement in Österreichische Post (Case C-300/21) on a crucial issue: the extent to which data subjects affected by a breach of the GDPR have a right to compensation for non-material damage under Article 82 GDPR.
Background
The underlying case arose from a data subject in Austria seeking 1,000 EUR ($1,009) in compensation for alleged non-material damages arising from Österreichische Post’s processing of his personal data for the purposes of political advertising. The individual had not consented to the processing and claimed that he felt offended by the fact that an affinity to a certain political party was attributed to him, alongside feelings of great upset, loss of confidence and exposure caused by the retention of his data on these supposed political opinions.