The EU Commission accuses social media giant Meta of violating the EU's digital market laws, DMA.
The reason is that Meta has been offering European Facebook and Instagram users the option to pay to avoid ads since November. This is a response to stricter EU regulations requiring users to give their consent to be exposed to tailored ads and the data collection that entails.
The Commission now believes in a preliminary assessment that the choice – between paying or giving consent to ads – does not allow users to "exercise their right to freely" decide how personal data is used.
Meta now has the opportunity to respond to the accusations from the Commission, whose investigation will continue until March next year. The company risks billion-kronor fines equivalent to 10 percent of its annual revenues.
The Commission has been investigating other tech companies, such as Microsoft and Apple, for violating digital market laws since earlier.
