The European Union fines Apple 500 million euros and Meta 200 million in separate digital cases

By KELVIN CHAN Associated Press Business Writer LONDON AP European Union watchdogs fined Apple and Meta hundreds of millions of euros Wednesday as they stepped up enforcement of the -nation bloc s digital competition rules The European Commission imposed a million euro million fine on Apple for preventing app makers from pointing users to cheaper options outside its App Store The commission which is the EU s executive arm also fined Meta Platforms million euros because it forced Facebook and Instagram users to choose between seeing personalized ads or paying to avoid them The punishments were smaller than the blockbuster multibillion-euro fines that the commission has previously slapped on Big Tech companies in antitrustcases Apple and Meta have to comply with the decisions within days or exposure unspecified periodic penalty payments the commission stated The decisions were expected to come in March but the self-imposed deadline slipped amid an escalating trans-Atlantic bargain war with U S President Donald Trump who has repeatedly complained about regulations from Brussels affecting American companies The penalties were issued under the EU s Digital Markets Act also known as the DMA It s a sweeping rulebook that amounts to a set of do s and don ts designed to give consumers and businesses more choice and prevent Big Tech gatekeepers from cornering digital markets The DMA seeks to ensure that citizens have full control over when and how their input is used online and businesses can freely communicate with their own customers Henna Virkkunen the commission s executive vice-president for tech sovereignty explained in a message The decisions adopted in the modern day find that both Apple and Meta have taken away this free choice from their users and are required to change their behavior Virkkunen commented Both companies indicated they would appeal Apple accused the commission of unfairly targeting the iPhone maker and explained it continues to move the goal posts despite the company s efforts to comply with the rules Meta Chief Global Affairs Officer Joel Kaplan revealed in a declaration that the Commission is attempting to handicap accomplished American businesses while allowing Chinese and European companies to operate under different standards In a press briefing in Brussels commission spokespeople sought to tamp down concerns that the penalties would inflame pact tensions We don t care who owns a company We don t care where the company is located commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier informed reporters We are totally agnostic on that front from a European Union And be it a Chinese company be an American company or be it a European company you will have to play by the rules in the European Union In the App Store situation the Commission had accused the iPhone maker of imposing unfair rules preventing app developers from freely steering consumers to other channels Among the DMA s provisions are requirements to let developers inform customers of cheaper purchasing options and direct them to those offers The commission stated it ordered Apple to remove technical and commercial restrictions that prevent developers from steering users to other channels and to end non-compliant conduct Apple revealed it has spent hundreds of thousands of engineering hours and made dozens of changes to comply with this law none of which our users have sought for Despite countless meetings the Commission continues to move the goal posts every step of the way the company announced The EU s Meta study centered on the company s strategy to comply with strict European content privacy rules by giving users the option of paying for ad-free versions of Facebook and Instagram Users could pay at least a month to avoid being targeted by ads based on their personal input The U S tech giant rolled out the option after the European Union s top court ruled Meta must first get consent before showing ads to users Regulators took issue with Meta s model saying it doesn t allow users to exercise their right to freely consent to allowing their personal facts from its various services which also including Facebook Marketplace WhatsApp and Messenger to be combined for personalized ads Meta rolled out a third option in November giving Facebook and Instagram users in Europe the option to see fewer personalized ads if they don t want to pay for an ad-free subscription The commission stated it s in the present assessing this option and continues to hold talks with Meta and has urged the company to provide evidence of the new option s impact This isn t just about a fine the Commission forcing us to change our business model effectively imposes a multi-billion-dollar tariff on Meta while requiring us to offer an inferior system Kaplan noted And by unfairly restricting personalized advertising the European Commission is also hurting European businesses and economies