POLITICO reports that EU elections, scheduled for this May, are thought to present an attractive target for nation-state hacking and influence operations. The US Democratic National Committee has amended its civil complaint against Russia (and others) to include post-midterm hacking attempts.

France's CNIL (Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertés) has fined Google €50 million over GDPR issues, essentially lack of transparency in user consent, the Telegraph reports. Former Facebook CISO Alex Stamos is interested to see whether GDPR will prove to be more about competition than privacy.

Stamos's point is worth considering, but Ad Exchanger noticed in November that CNIL had warned a small European ad company, Vectaury, about possible violations despite Vectaury's having structured its operations in accordance with the IAB GDPR Transparency and Consent Framework, generally thought a safe guide to compliance.

Russian censorship authority Roskomnadzor has opened an administrative enforcement action against Facebook and Twitter, the Wall Street Journal reports. The communications agency says the two social networks haven't complied with requirements that data on Russian citizens be stored in Russia.

SecurityWeek notes that Facebook may be set for a large fine in the US: the Federal Trade Commission is said to be preparing an enforcement action against the company for privacy failings related to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

The Washington Post has new details on Russia's arrest of Paul Whelan on espionage charges. He is said to have been passed a USB drive containing secret information. Whether he knew that's what he'd received remains unclear.