Xinhua News Agency, Brussels, June 4 (Reporter Chen Wenxian and Li Jizhi) The European Commission issued a statement on the 4th that the European Commission has officially launched an investigation into whether Facebook has violated EU competition rules.
stated that the European Commission will assess whether Facebook uses the data it collects from advertisers to conduct unfair competition in areas such as classified advertising. At the same time, the European Commission will also assess whether Facebook’s binding of its online classified advertising service “Facebook Mall” to social networks violates regulations.
After preliminary investigations, the European Commission believes that Facebook may distort the competition of online classified advertising services, especially the use of Facebook’s gains from competitors’ ads Data helps “Facebook Mall” gain a competitive advantage.
The European Commission will also review whether embedding “Facebook Mall” into social networks constitutes a tie-in sale, so that it can gain an advantage in reaching customers and hinder competition in online classified advertising services .
The European Commission’s executive vice chairman of digitalization and fair competition, Vestag, said in a statement that Facebook has nearly 3 billion monthly active users and nearly 7 million companies. Advertise on Facebook, which collects a large amount of user data to enable it to target specific customer groups. In today’s digital economy, data should not be used in a way that distorts competition. The European Commission will carefully study and judge whether the above data will give Facebook an undue competitive advantage.
On the same day, the UK Competition and Markets Authority issued a statement saying that the UK has also launched an investigation into the use of Facebook data. The European Commission stated that as their respective investigations deepen, the European Union will seek close cooperation with the United Kingdom.
(The original title is: EU launches antitrust investigation on Facebook)