EU, UK launch probe
The EU and the UK launched parallel competition probes yesterday against Facebook, accused of using data from advertisers to unfairly dominate the online classifieds market.
The US social media behemoth sells classified advertising on its Marketplace service, but also gathers data from commercial advertising that may give it an unfair advantage.
Investigators will also probe whether Facebook's single user log-in allows it to unfairly use data gathered across its social media, dating app and advertising platforms.
The cases opened by the European Commission and Britain's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) are separate, but the regulators are working closely together.
"Facebook collects vast troves of data on the activities of users of its social network and beyond," EU vice-president and competition chief Margrethe Vestager said.
"We will look in detail at whether this data gives Facebook an undue competitive advantage in particular on 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," she said, "In today's digital economy, data should not be used in ways that distort competition."
The formal probe follows a preliminary investigation focused on Facebook's Marketplace classifieds service -- available to most of its three billion users. Companies advertising on Marketplace have to provide data to Facebook which the Commission said led to concerns that the internet giant may distort competition.
The European Commission noted in its statement that former EU member Britain's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) also yesterday opened its own probe into the way Facebook uses data.
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