French government gets go ahead to trawl social media for tax cheats
Authorities can now check profiles and photos for evidence of possible offences
Your support helps us to tell the story
This election is still a dead heat, according to most polls. In a fight with such wafer-thin margins, we need reporters on the ground talking to the people Trump and Harris are courting. Your support allows us to keep sending journalists to the story.
The Independent is trusted by 27 million Americans from across the entire political spectrum every month. Unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock you out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. But quality journalism must still be paid for.
Help us keep bring these critical stories to light. Your support makes all the difference.
France has been given the green light by the constitutional court to use social media to clamp down on tax avoidance.
Customs and tax officials will be able to collect and monitor information that has been shared publicly on certain platforms as they try to detect possible offences.
Gerald Darmanin, the budget minister, celebrated the news on Twitter, saying: “The constitutional court has just ruled that this experiment conforms to the constitution.
“One more tool to fight fraud!”
The court said there were concerns over how the drafted powers could threaten users’ privacy and freedom of expression.
The ruling imposed some conditions for the plans, which would give tax authorities powers to check social media profiles and pictures, to go ahead.
Authorities would have to ensure password-protected content on social media platforms was off limits, the ruling said.
The court said that authorities would only be able to use public information pertaining to the person divulging it online.
They also required that regulators would have to closely monitor how the data was being exploited.
The new powers to trawl social media for fraud should be reviewed at the end of the three-year experiment, the court said.
Additional reporting by Reuters
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments