Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President responsible for competition policy, said: "Our concerns relate in particular to our preliminary finding that Meta links its online classifieds service Facebook Marketplace with its dominant social network Facebook." The Commission also fears that Meta will give competitors Facebook Marketplace may impose unfair trading conditions for its own benefit. Vestager explained: “If these concerns are confirmed, there would be unlawful behavior on the part of Meta.”
Meta is a multinational technology company from the USA. Its most important business area is the social network Facebook, through which registered users can create profiles, upload photos and videos, send messages and make contacts with other people. Meta also provides the online classifieds service Facebook Marketplace, through which users can buy and sell goods.
Complaints about Meta's coupling practices and advertising data
The Commission preliminarily finds that Meta holds a dominant position in the social networking market covering the whole of Europe and in the national markets for online display advertising services on social media.
The Commission has made a preliminary assessment that Meta abused its dominant position in two ways:
- First, links its online classifieds service Facebook Marketplace with its dominant social network Facebook . This means Facebook users automatically have access to Facebook Marketplace, whether they want it or not. The Commission suspects that Facebook Marketplace's competitors could be forced out of the market because the link gives Facebook Marketplace a significant sales advantage that competitors cannot make up for.
- Second imposes unfair trading conditions on competing online classified advertising services that advertise on Facebook or Instagram . The Commission suspects that the terms and conditions - which allow Meta to use advertising-related data from competitors for Facebook Marketplace - may be unjustified, disproportionate and unnecessary for the provision of online display advertising services on Meta's platforms. These conditions place a burden on competitors and solely benefit Facebook Marketplace.
If the Commission's concerns are confirmed, there would be a breach of Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), which prohibits abuse of a dominant position.
The statement of objections does not prejudge the outcome of the investigation.
Antitrust investigation of Meta and Google into online display advertising discontinued
The European Commission has decided to close its antitrust investigation into an alleged anti-competitive agreement between Meta and Google for online display advertising services (the so-called “Jedi Blue” agreement).
The Commission opened the investigation on March 11, 2022 to determine whether Meta and Google had agreed to weaken a competing technology to Google's open bidding and exclude it from the market for displaying advertising on publishers' websites and apps.
After a careful assessment of all relevant evidence, including information received from Meta, Google and other companies active in the technology sector, the Commission concluded that the evidence did not support its initial concerns.
Source:
European Commission
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