Türkiye fines Facebook US$159,000 a day until it changes advertising practices

Türkiye has imposed this Wednesday a daily fine of 4.8 million lire (currently about US$ 159,000 or 145,000 euros) on Meta, the parent company of Whatsapp, Instagram and Facebook, until it presents a plan to stop sharing user data between its different branches.

The measure aims to force Meta to comply with the obligations imposed in October 2022, when the company was already fined 346 million liras, then about 18.5 million euros, the Turkish Competition Authority explained today in a statement.

This body then considered that Meta violated competition in the advertising market by unifying and sharing the personal data of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp users, thus acquiring a dominant position that prevents other companies from competing on equal terms.

He then demanded Goal to inform him within a month of the measures he would take to put an end to that position, put them into practice within half a year and report annually on it for another five years.

Competition then extended the deadlines for receiving the first report on the proposed measures, but has now considered that what was proposed until last December does not comply with what is required, so it now imposes a daily fine of 4,796 million Turkish liras, currently about 145,000 euros.

The fine is counted from last December 12, and until Meta delivers the required report, says the Turkish Authority.

The multinational, which in 2021 earned around $115 billion from advertising, is also being investigated by the European Commission for possible abuse of a dominant position.

In addition, last May Ireland fined Meta 1.2 billion euros for transferring user data to the United States, and last December, 83 Spanish companies filed a lawsuit against Meta for unfair competition, claiming 550 million euros.