PARIS (AP) — France's highest administrative court has upheld a fine of 50 million euros ($56 million) Google was ordered to pay for not being "sufficiently clear and transparent" with Android users about their data protection options.

Google was first slapped with the fine in January 2019, the first penalty for a U.S. tech giant under new European data privacy rules that took effect in 2018.

Google appealed the penalty issued by France's data privacy watchdog to France's Council of State, the final arbiter in such cases.

The council ruled Friday that the National Data Protection Commission watchdog had the right to sanction Google and that the fine was not disproportionate.