Meta’s abuse of its dominant position in the social networking market

BIICL’s goal was to file a formal complaint to the European Commission demanding that they open an investigation into Meta on the basis that Meta are in breach of EU competition law.

BIICL argue that Meta is abusing its dominant position in the social networking market by imposing unfair trading conditions and excessive pricing (Article 102(a) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union).

In order to gather empirical evidence to demonstrate harm to consumers from Meta’s exploitation of data and privacy BIICL carried out a choice modelling exercise in Germany in 2020.

The choice modelling was used to answer the following questions:

1. Does data privacy in social networks matter to consumers?
2. How do consumers value targeted advertisement in social networks?

The exercise showed that:

• Data privacy in social networks does matter to German users and that they are not willing to accept the use of their data in exchange for a targeted advertisement of higher quality. German users are only willing to accept the use of their data if they get in return a monetary incentive.
• 62% of respondents were not aware of what the social network could do with their data.

BIICL concluded that Meta’s conduct in the social network market is a departure from competition on the merits (i.e. exploitation) that amounts to a quality degradation for many users and that underpins Meta’s growth in display advertising.

On 2 February 2021, BIICL met with the European Commission and submitted a complaint about Meta’s exploitative data practices. The European Commission decided not to enforce against Meta’s exploitative abuses, but instead pursued a case against Facebook’s abusive practices in Facebook Marketplace.

On 14 November 2024, the European Commission decided that Meta had breached EU antitrust rules by tying its online classified ads service Facebook Marketplace to its personal social network Facebook and by imposing unfair trading conditions on other online classified ads service providers. This resulted in a fine of €797.72 million. 

In related litigation not funded by DFF, on 14 February 2022, Dr Liza Lovdahl Gormsen, Senior Research Fellow at BIICL, initiated private action against Meta on behalf of 46 million UK Facebook users for its exploitative data practices before the Competition Appeal Tribunal in London. On 15 February 2024, a collective proceeding order was issued, allowing the case against Meta to proceed. Meta appealed, but lost before the Court of Appeal and the case is currently being prepared for full trial.