Because El Pais, El Mundo, La Vanguardia denounce Meta in Spain
Facebook's holding company faces a half-billion-euro lawsuit from Spanish newspapers. 83 media in Spain have reported Meta for unfair competition in advertising. All the details
In Spain, newspapers bring Meta to trial for unfair competition in the advertising market.
Eighty-three Spanish media outlets united in the Association of Information Media (AMI) have filed a 550 million euro ($600 million) lawsuit against Facebook owner Meta Platforms, claiming that advertising profits were obtained illegitimately.
The lawsuit is the latest attempt by mainstream media to fight tech giants in the courts to protect their business. Around the world, media organizations have fought in courts and parliaments to make tech giants pay fair rates for using and sharing their content, Reuters said.
Spanish media have also already scored a victory against Alphabet's Google News service, which the government shut down in 2014 before reopening in 2022 under new legislation that allows media outlets to negotiate rates directly with the tech giant.
All the details.
THE LAWSUIT BROUGHT BY THE MEDIA AGAINST META IN SPAIN
The Ami media association said in a Dec. 4 statement that the lawsuit was filed collectively by the newspapers on Friday in a commercial court in Madrid.
“The time has come to put an end to the behavior of technology companies that can afford to pay millions in fines for continuing to violate regulations, destroying the market in which we operate and appropriating illegitimately obtained revenues,” said Irene Lanzaco, director general of 'Do you love.
THE COMPLAINT IS BROKEN BY EL PAIS, EL MUNDO AND ABC
The AMI, which has more than 80 members including the newspaper publishers of El País, El Mundo ABC and La Vanguardia, is seeking more than 550 million euros in compensation for what they describe as Meta's "systematic and massive non-compliance" with the European GDPR, in force since May 2018, which requires that any website requests permission to store and use personal data.
THE ACCUSATION
According to the accusation, the US social giant would have systematically violated European data protection regulations (GDPR) from 25 May 2018 until at least 31 July 2023. Meta would have methodically used the personal data of users of its platforms, tracking them without their consent throughout digital browsing. This would have allowed the US company to offer the sale of advertising space on the market thanks to a competitive advantage obtained illegitimately.
The newspapers argue that Meta's "massive" and "systematic" use of the personal data of users of its Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp platforms gives it an unfair advantage in designing and serving personalized adverts, which they say constitutes unfair competition.
THE POSITION OF THE GROUP LED BY ZUCKERBERG
At the moment Meta's press office has not responded to requests for comment. A Meta source familiar with the matter said the company has yet to receive legal documents.
META'S MANEUVERS ON ADVERTISING IN THE EU
Without forgetting that last July the EU Court of Justice ruled that Meta cannot force users from member countries to accept personalized ads, stating that users must freely give their consent. Meta responded by offering ad-free versions of Facebook and Instagram for European users for a monthly fee .
As TechCrunch notes, in November Meta moved to claiming consent as the legal basis for its ad tracking business in the EU. However, the choice it has designed for regional users requires them to choose between paying a monthly subscription for an ad-free version of its products or “opting in” to being tracked and profiled . This is despite the GDPR establishing that consent must be "freely given" to be legally obtained.
RAIN OF LAWSUITS COMING ON FACEBOOK?
Finally, the Spanish case could be just the first drop in a shower of similar cases in EU member countries.
“Of course, in any other country in the European Union, the same legal procedure could be initiated” regarding an alleged violation of European rules, Nicolas Gonzalez Cuellar, a lawyer representing the newspapers, told Reuters .
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/perche-el-pais-el-mundo-la-vanguardia-denunciano-meta-in-spagna/ on Tue, 05 Dec 2023 10:53:15 +0000.