The country's Data Protection Commissioner said it had found that "Meta Platforms failed to have in place appropriate technical and organisational measures which would enable it to readily demonstrate the security measures that it implemented in practice to protect EU users' data".

Ireland regulates Meta and a number of other large U.S. Internet giants because their European Union headquarters are in the country.

The Data Protection Commissioner, which has a number of ongoing investigations into Meta, last year fined its WhatsApp subsidiary a record 225 million euros for failing to conform with EU data rules in 2018.

Meta said that it would "carefully consider” the decision" athough it is "processes continue to evolve."

"This fine is about record-keeping practices from 2018 that we have since (been) updated, not a failure to protect people's information," the spokesperson said.