Dating agency under the name ANOIXIS – €45,000 Fine (Greece, 2024)

Throughout 2024, the DPA received 15 complaints from various data subjects, regarding unsolicited communication via short text messages (SMS) by the dating agency ANOIXIS, the controller. The DPA considered the sender of these unsolicited SMS to be the same controller who had been previously fined €54,000 according to the DPA's decision 16/2022, for unsolicited communication, after having received 36 complaints from data subjects. As part of the examination of the complaints, the DPA sent the controller a number of documents equal to the number of complaints (15), requesting their views on the attached complaints, none of which were answered. Subsequently, the DPA sent the controller an official summons to a hearing on 30/10/2024 in order to present their views regarding the 15 filed complaints within the year 2024. The controller, however, did not attend. The DPA held that the issue of conducting unsolicited communications through any means of electronic communication, without human intervention, for the purposes of direct commercial promotion of products or services and for any kind of advertising purposes, is regulated by [https://www.dpa.gr/sites/default/files/2019-09/%CE%9D3471_06.PDF Article 11 Law 3471/2006 on the protection of personal data in the field of electronic communications], which incorporated [https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A02002L0058-20091219 (eprivacy-)Directive 2002/58/EC] into the national legal framework. According to [https://www.dpa.gr/sites/default/files/2019-09/%CE%9D3471_06.PDF Article 11(1) Law 3471/2006], such communication is only allowed if the subscriber has explicitly given prior consent. According to [https://www.dpa.gr/sites/default/files/2019-09/%CE%9D3471_06.PDF Article 11(3) Law 3471/2006], any electronic message is permitted without the prior consent of the data subject only if the contact details have been lawfully obtained in the context of a previous sale of products or services or another tr