{"id":44270,"date":"2025-04-23T16:22:08","date_gmt":"2025-04-23T16:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/44270\/"},"modified":"2025-04-23T16:22:08","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T16:22:08","slug":"european-union-watchdogs-fine-meta-apple-for-antitrust-violations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/44270\/","title":{"rendered":"European Union watchdogs fine Meta, Apple for antitrust violations"},"content":{"rendered":"

The European Union<\/a> Commission fined Apple and Meta hundreds of millions of dollars for allegedly violating broad EU regulations over Big Tech<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2022, the world\u2019s most sweeping tech regulation became law<\/a> with the passage of the European Commission\u2019s Digital Market Act. The law affected U.S.-based tech giants operating overseas and was aimed at making \u201cdigital markets in the EU more contestable and fairer.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, the European Union watchdogs imposed a $571 million fine on Apple, claiming the company broke the DMA by restricting app developers from marketing cheaper options for users outside Apple\u2019s own app store and failing \u201cto demonstrate that these restrictions are objectively necessary and proportionate.\u201d<\/p>\n

The commission also fined Meta Platforms $227 million for using a system under which European Facebook and Instagram users had to choose between seeing personalized ads or paying to avoid them.<\/p>\n

This \u201cpay-or-consent model\u201d violated the DMA, \u201cas it did not give users the required specific choice to opt for a service that uses less of their personal data but is otherwise equivalent to the \u2018personalised ads\u2019 service,\u201d the commission said.<\/p>\n

The DMA seeks to ensure \u201cthat citizens have full control over when and how their data is used online, and businesses can freely communicate with their own customers,\u201d Henna Virkkunen, the commission\u2019s executive vice president for tech sovereignty, said<\/a> in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a duty to protect the rights of citizens and innovative businesses in Europe,\u201d Virkkunen continued. \u201cThe decisions adopted today find that both Apple and Meta have taken away this free choice from their users and are required to change their behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meta and Apple have condemned the fines, suggesting the EU is targeting U.S. businesses unfairly.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t just about a fine; the Commission is forcing us to change our business model, effectively imposing a multi-billion-dollar tariff on Meta while requiring us to offer an inferior service,\u201d Joel Kaplan, Meta\u2019s Chief Global Affairs Officer, told the Washington Examiner.<\/p>\n

\"EUEU Commission vice president Margrethe Vestager addresses the media on Apple Music streaming services at EU headquarters in Brussels, Monday, March 4, 2024. Vestager addressed the media after the 27-nation bloc slapped a massive 1.8 billion fine on Apple for allegedly abusing its dominant position when it comes to music streaming services. (AP Photo\/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)<\/p>\n

THE EUROPEAN UNION IS NOW THE WORLD\u2019S MOST AGGRESSIVE REGULATOR OF DIGITAL MARKETS<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd by unfairly restricting personalized advertising the European Commission is also hurting European businesses and economies,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Apple announced it would appeal against the fine, accusing the European Commission of \u201cunfairly targeting Apple in a series of decisions that are bad for the privacy and security of our users, bad for products, and force us to give away our technology for free,\u201d the company said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The European Union Commission fined Apple and Meta hundreds of millions of dollars for allegedly violating broad EU…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[1662,1394,2000,299,5187,1699,598,1232,46,53],"class_list":{"0":"post-44270","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-apple","9":"tag-big-tech","10":"tag-eu","11":"tag-europe","12":"tag-european","13":"tag-european-union","14":"tag-meta","15":"tag-money","16":"tag-policy","17":"tag-technology"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}