Voting was conducted in the European Parliament on Monday to strengthen Europe's data protection laws. It also included the proposal of fines of up to 100 million euros on companies such as Yahoo!, Facebook or Google if they break the rules.

The voting has paved the way for further negotiations with EU countries and the European Commission on the plans. It is the first revision to the data laws in Europe since 1995.

After two decades, plethora of changes has taken place in data generation, storage, sharing and viewing. The situation has sparked growing concerns for protection of individuals and that is why lawmakers are determined to get ahead of the game and draft rules for the same.

"The European Parliament has just given its full backing to a strong and uniform European data protection law that will cut costs for business and strengthen the protection of our citizens: one continent, one law", said EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding.

The parliament's civil liberties committee has devised almost 4,000 amendments to the original plan. It also includes the fine up to five percent of annual worldwide turnover or 100 million euros, whichever is greater. `Right to be forgotten' will also be replaced by the `right of erasure' when the changes take place.