Precedent corpus / EDPB (European Data Protection Board)
European Data Protection Board
EDPB (European Data Protection Board) case GL-05-2020, decided 2020-05-04. No monetary penalty (reprimand or guidance).
Regulator guidance (positive exemplar)
What the regulator decided
Valid consent requires "a clear affirmative action" by which the data subject signifies agreement; "the use of pre-ticked opt-in boxes is invalid under the GDPR" and "silence or inactivity on the part of the data subject, as well as merely proceeding with a service" cannot be regarded as an active indication of choice (paragraphs 75 and 79).
Primary source
Regulator-owned URL. Quote this in legal briefs and academic citations.
https://www.edpb.europa.eu/our-work-tools/our-documents/guidelines/guidelines-052020-consent-under-regulation-2016679_enConsentMark interpretation
Operator-readable note on how this case shapes the ConsentMark scanner narrative. Not a legal opinion; cites the primary source.
[Type: guidance] Non-enforcement document. Use this entry as the regulator-language anchor for the "consent-gated done right" zone of the scanner narrative - it defines what a compliant pattern looks like in the EDPB's own words. The verbatim quotes in `finding` come from paragraphs 75 ("clear affirmative act ... active motion or declaration") and 79 ("pre-ticked opt-in boxes ... invalid") of the consolidated v1.1 PDF hosted on edpb.europa.eu.
Verification trail
- Verified by
- donal
- Verified at
- 2026-05-23
- Review due
- 2026-08-21
Cite this case
Pick the format that matches where you are pasting. The methodology version is preserved in every variant so the citation stays verifiable after future methodology changes.
@misc{consentmark-precedent-edpb-gl-05-2020,
author = {{ConsentMark}},
year = {2020},
title = {EDPB (European Data Protection Board) GL-05-2020 - European Data Protection Board},
howpublished = {\url{https://www.consentmark.com/precedent/edpb-gl-05-2020}},
note = {ConsentMark methodology v1.3}
}ConsentMark. (2020, May 4). EDPB (European Data Protection Board) GL-05-2020 - European Data Protection Board. Methodology v1.3. https://www.consentmark.com/precedent/edpb-gl-05-2020[EDPB (European Data Protection Board) GL-05-2020 - European Data Protection Board - ConsentMark](https://www.consentmark.com/precedent/edpb-gl-05-2020)EDPB (European Data Protection Board) GL-05-2020 - European Data Protection Board - ConsentMark, 2020-05-04, methodology v1.3, https://www.consentmark.com/precedent/edpb-gl-05-2020