The European Commission on Friday accused Meta and TikTok of violating the EU's signature social media rules. The EU executive said Facebook and Instagram owned by Meta, as well as TikTok, had failed to meet their obligations to open platform data to researchers. At the same time, Facebook and Instagram are also considered to be deficient in three obligations: helping users report illegal content and appeal content review decisions.
Under the Digital Services Act (DSA), relevant platforms have the right to respond to the European Commission’s accusations. If they fail to convince EU enforcement agencies, they could face fines of up to 6% of annual global revenue.
Meta company spokesman Ben Walters said: "We do not agree with any assertion that we have violated the DSA and are currently continuing to negotiate with the Commission on these issues." He also said that Meta has made adjustments in content reporting options, appeal processes and data access tools since the DSA came into effect, and is confident that these measures have complied with EU legal requirements.
TikTok spokesman Paolo Ganino said the company is "reviewing the European Commission's findings, but relaxing data protection requirements puts the DSA in direct conflict with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). If full compliance with both regulations is not possible, we urge regulators to clarify how to reconcile these obligations." Ganino added that the company has invested heavily in data sharing, and about 1,000 research teams have so far gained access to data through its research tools.
This action is part of the EU’s ongoing efforts to enforce digital regulations. Meta is the second U.S. platform to be accused of violations: Elon Musk’s X platform was already accused of violations in July 2024. China's Temu and AliExpress have also been accused by the EU of violating regulations.
The European Commission launched an investigation into Meta in April last year and expanded the scope of the investigation in May. TikTok’s investigation began in February 2024 and was expanded twice in April and December (the April part was closed after TikTok agreed to withdraw related products in Europe).
No investigation has resulted in any fines.
The European Commission said that Facebook and Instagram failed to provide sufficiently user-friendly mechanisms to report illegal content and that the platform's interface design was "misleading." In addition, both companies have been criticized for not being user-friendly enough in the design of their interfaces for challenging content moderation decisions.
There are other aspects of the investigation that are not yet complete, including how the platforms protect minors and their role in election manipulation.
The Trump administration in the United States has repeatedly criticized the EU's DSA regulations, calling it "Orwellian" and accusing the EU of censorship.