Antitrust: Possible anti-competitive practices by Facebook?

Jun 30, 2021 Benn-Ibler Rechtsanwälte

The European Commission has launched an antitrust investigation into Facebook. The suspicion is that Facebook might have violated EU rules on anti-competitive agreements (Article 101 TFEU) and/or on abuse of a dominant market position (Article 102 TFEU) by using advertising data gathered in particular from advertisers to compete with them in other markets such as classified ads.

The Commission's investigation will determine the extent to which Facebook's position as a social network and its role in the area of online advertising may affect competition in neighboring markets where the company is also present through its social network, in particular in the area of online classified ads.

There is a suspicion that Facebook might exploit commercially relevant data of its competitors in order to gain competitive advantages, in particular on Facebook's online classifieds service "Facebook Marketplace". Specifically, Facebook could use data from the advertising activities of its competitors to analyze user preferences and adapt "Facebook Marketplace" accordingly.

In this context, the form in which the online classifieds service is embedded into the platform is also to be reviewed. It will be examined whether this results in a linkage which enables Facebook to reach customers more effectively in an unfair manner and thus distorts competition with other providers.

The EU Commissioner in charge of competition policy stated, "We will look in detail at whether these data give Facebook an undue competitive advantage in particular in the online classified ads sector, where people buy and sell goods every day, and where Facebook also competes with companies from which it collects data. In today's digital economy, data should not be used in ways that distort competition.”  

EU-Commission, Press release, 04.06.2021