The National Assembly in Paris voted 11-10 to tax data sent to French internet users, as part of an amendment to the 2027 budget. The tax would apply €0.055 per gigabyte, with estimates from the amendment suggesting the measure could raise around €10 billion a year. Measurement would be performed by internet providers who track data flowing to customers and record totals for the tax authorities every quarter, under oversight by Arcep. The data would be counted irrespective of content, including data that travels via content delivery networks. Taxed data would be capped at 15% of a company’s French revenue or 2% of its global revenue. The amendment cites Arcep’s estimate of about 200 billion gigabytes reaching French subscribers annually, with Google, Meta, Amazon, Netflix and Akamai accounting for roughly half of that traffic. Critics have questioned whether the tax would be passed on to users of services like Facebook, Instagram or TikTok, which are often free. Public Accounts Minister David Amiel said sensors or device-level measurements would be needed, and noted that half of the tax would fall on smaller, often French, providers—roughly €5 billion under the authors’ estimates. Finance committee spokesperson Philippe Juvin warned that large platforms could shift the cost to advertisers. VideoLAN, the nonprofit behind VLC, warned the tax would cost it more than €1 million per year, given VLC’s billions of downloads. The next steps include consideration by the Senate, where party control could block the measure, or possible legislative maneuvering to omit the amendment from the budget text. France already taxes big tech through a digital services tax, and Amiel pointed to EU penalties and other tools as alternatives.