Meta's Ad Business Slapped With Interim Measures in France Over Suspected Antitrust Abuse

upstart writes:

Meta's ad business slapped with interim measures in France over suspected antitrust abuse:

More regulatory woes for Meta: France's competition watchdog has announced interim measures on the adtech giant - saying it suspects it of abusing a dominant position in the French market for ads on social media and across the broader (non-search-related) online ads market.

It's ordering Meta to suspend application of the current criteria it imposes for granting ad verification partnerships; and giving it two months to define and publish new rules for accessing and maintaining viewability and brand safety partnerships which the Authority specifies must be "objective, transparent, non-discriminatory and proportionate".

Meta must also have a transparent access procedure for the partnerships that is not based on an invitation it sends, the order also stipulates.

The antitrust intervention follows a complaint by Adloox, a French ad verification platform that sells anti-ad-fraud and brand safety services. It complained to the Autorite de la Concurrence about Meta's conduct between 2016 and 2022, accusing the company of denying it the same kind of access to its ecosystem that some of its competitors have been granted, harming its ability to provide its services.

Adloox claims Meta discriminatorily denied it access to the aforementioned viewability and brand safety partnerships - despite providing such access to other companies in similar circumstances.

It also accuses Meta of abusing a dominant position by imposing unfair access conditions by providing only partial access to its ecosystem. And its complaint asked the Autorite to impose interim measures intended to force Meta to provide the sought for access.

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