National Assembly approves €0.055/GB data tax amendment

France’s National Assembly has narrowly approved amendment I-1358 to the 2027 budget bill, introducing a proposed tax of €0.055 per gigabyte of data transmitted to internet users in France. The vote took place on October 30, 2026, and passed by 11 votes to 10, with 14 abstentions, after earlier opposition in the Finance Committee and from the government and the budget’s general rapporteur.

The measure would apply to data volumes rather than digital revenues, creating a new tax base built on gigabytes delivered to subscribers of French internet providers. It is currently one component of the broader 2027 finance bill and remains subject to further parliamentary stages before it can take effect.

Under the amendment, content providers that send data to French internet users would be responsible for paying the tax, not households or internet access providers. The rate is set at €0.055, or 5.5 euro cents, for every gigabyte delivered, meaning 100 GB of traffic would correspond to a theoretical levy of €5.50 and 1,000 GB to €55 before any caps are applied.

Telecom operators would measure, consolidate and anonymise the data volumes associated with each content provider and report them quarterly to the French tax administration. The system also covers content delivery networks, with taxable amounts calculated on outgoing flows from these networks, while rules prohibit authorities from inspecting the actual content or specific destinations of the data.

To limit the burden on individual companies, the amendment caps annual liability at 15% of a provider’s revenue generated in France or 2% of its global revenue. These caps are intended to prevent tax bills from becoming disproportionate when traffic volumes are high relative to monetised revenue in the French market.

The explanatory statement to the amendment highlights five large players — Google (GOOGL), Meta (META), Amazon (AMZN), Netflix (NFLX) and Akamai — which are estimated to account for about half of the 200 billion gigabytes of data sent each year to French internet subscribers. At the proposed rate, this overall traffic implies a theoretical yield of about €11 billion before applying caps and adjustments.

Supporters of the measure expect the levy to generate approximately €10 billion annually once caps and other factors are taken into account. The proposal is not limited to the five named companies; other platforms such as video services, gaming distributors, cloud providers and software platforms could also fall within scope depending on their data volumes.

Examples given in the debate include large game downloads, which could face several euros of tax per title, and typical fixed-line connections that consumed an average of 267 GB per month at the start of 2026. At the proposed rate, that usage level would correspond to a theoretical tax of €14.70 per month per connection, before considering company-specific caps.

The amendment advanced despite formal opposition from the French government and concerns raised about potential effects on smaller domestic content providers. Public Accounts Minister David Amiel has estimated that a significant share of the eventual yield could fall on smaller companies, not only on large international platforms.

The October 30 vote represents only one step in the budget process. The full 2027 finance bill still has to be adopted in its entirety by the National Assembly and then examined by the Senate, which can rewrite or remove the per-gigabyte provision. The measure therefore remains a proposal rather than an operative tax.

Earlier commentary has also noted that the bill could be modified during later stages of the budget procedure. Until final legislation is enacted and implementing rules are defined, there is no automatic change for French subscribers, internet bills or corporate pricing structures.

Following the vote, Netflix shares closed at $62.08, up 0.05%, while Alphabet fell 1.4% to $279.84 and Meta Platforms slipped 1.53% to $614.99. These price moves were not linked directly to the French tax decision.

Analysts point to differing exposure levels among major platforms because of how they generate traffic and revenue. Netflix’s business is centred on video streaming, giving it heavy data usage relative to revenue, while Alphabet generates most of its income from search advertising, which produces comparatively low traffic volumes alongside its YouTube service.

Other large platforms such as Meta, Amazon and infrastructure provider Akamai are also named in the amendment’s supporting documents due to their substantial share of French data flows. However, any eventual tax liabilities would depend on final legislative terms, detailed implementing rules and the interaction with the revenue-based caps.