The EU may slap Meta with big fines over Marketplace alleged anti-competitive practices

The EU is regularly scrutinizing big tech giants in order to ensure the digital market space remains competitive. Usually, tech giants are faced with notable fines if the EU finds they are playing unfairly and limiting competition. Meta is now in trouble (which happens quite often, not only to Meta, but also Apple, Google, and others) from the European Union of its Marketplace service. The allegations are, once again, anti-competitive practices.

EU is now investigating Meta for its Marketplace service and regulators are saying Meta adding its Facebook social network to its Marketplace service gives it an unfair advantage when it comes to the online marketplace space. Meta could face big fines in the EU if found guilty.

Basically, the EU claims that Meta is dominating the advertising market using unfair tactics. It seems the issue is that Meta has given Marketplace an unfair advantage with its integration into Facebook. The integration technically provides Marketplace with a much wider reach than other competitive services.

On top of that, regulators are concerned that Meta could be using data from Facebook to give Marketplace sellers an advantage as well. The EU suggests that Meta accessed data from businesses for free to then sell ads to people.

This antitrust investigation started in 2019 after Meta was accused by rival brands of being anti-competitive. Then, in December 2022, the investigation published initial findings that Meta was distorting competition.

The social media company is now facing fines of up to 10 percent of its global revenue if found that Marketplace is anti-competitive. Meta's global revenue for 2023 was reportedly $135 billion, and if found guilty, the fine may be quite substantial. Of course, the overall fine could be smaller, we don't know yet.

Reportedly, the regulators' decision may arrive as early as October. But of course, as usual with such cases, Meta can (and probably will) appeal any fines that could be placed.

I personally think that the EU is facing a tough challenge trying to regulate big tech giants. I still think it should continue trying to limit their power because I do happen to think there are certain players on the tech market that just have way too much power than what I would personally prefer.

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