Meta's 'pay or consent' policy breaks the Digital Markets Act, says Brussels

Meta's 'pay or consent' model asks users to enable the processing of their personal data or pay a monthly fee.

Transcript

00:00Brussels believes that Meta, owner of Facebook and Instagram, is violating European digital

00:07markets law with its consent-or-pay policy.

00:10Since last autumn, the U.S. company has been offering users either to give their consent

00:15to use their personal data for targeted ads or to pay to have an ad-free version.

00:21According to the commission, Meta is obliged to offer an alternative.

00:27We take the preliminary view that actually Meta has not shown this equivalent alternative

00:34to the end user who says no to the personal data combination.

00:40According to Europe's leading consumer organization, Meta is not offering a real choice.

00:48Meta has to change the choice screen that it has imposed on consumers since last autumn.

00:54The main thing is that it needs to provide a freely given choice to consumers.

01:01It needs to offer a freely given consent and especially it needs to provide an equivalent

01:08service to what consumers get today if consumers choose to not consent to the cross combination

01:18of their data across platform services.

01:22But when asked by Euronews, a Meta spokesperson believes the company is complying with the

01:27legislation.

01:29The ad-free subscription follows the direction of Europe's highest court and complies with

01:33the DMA.

01:35We look forward to continuing a constructive dialogue with the European Commission to bring

01:39this investigation to a close.

01:44The European Commission has until March to investigate the case.

01:49If Meta is found guilty, the company will have to pay a fine of up to 10% of its global

01:54turnover.