Matti Robinson
10 Dec 2020 12:21
Federal Trace Commission, better known as FTC, is taking the largest social media platform, Facebook, to court for illegitimate antitrust practices. Joined are 48 state prosecutors.
The charges against Facebook claim that the company has been abusing their competitive advantage in the marketplace in ways that violate the antitrust laws. Some of the largest error mentioned include the acquisition of Instagram for mere $1 billion in 2012 as well as a larger acquisition of WhatsApp in 2014 for $19 billion.
The prosecution sees these as buying off the competition and protecting the company's monopolistic nature in the marketplace. The House Antitrust Subcommittee in Congress released a report earlier couple months ago that called Facebook, among other platforms, monopolies.
In the filing there are mentions other less famous cases of potential antitrust violations committed by Facebook. In 2013 Facebook acquired a small VPN service and the prosecution claims that the company went through their user data to determine that WhatsApp popularity was indeed in the rise and followed up by acquiring the company.
As you might imagine, Facebook is denying any wrongdoing. The company says that the acquisitions went through FTC's regulatory measures and were cleared of any antitrust issues. They also says that it is in fact the resources and expertise within the Facebook that made the acquired platforms global powerhouses.