Meta, owner of Facebook, is fined again in the UK

The CMA, the British competition regulator, this Friday (4) imposed a new fine of 1.5 million pounds (R$ 10.8 million) on Meta, the parent company of Facebook, for breach of its obligations under its merger with Giphy, a specialist in short animations on the internet.

In October, Meta had already received a first fine of 50.5 million pounds (R$ 364 million).

According to the CMA, this new sanction is linked to the fact that Meta did not declare “the dismissal of three employees who held key positions” and “the reassignment of their positions”, while the company was obliged to do so as part of the regulator’s investigation of the merger.

“This is not the first time that Meta has not informed the CMA about personnel changes, which happened several times in 2021,” the regulator added in a statement.

The fine “will take into account the nature and seriousness of the infraction”.

According to Meta, the employees in question were based in the United States.

“We regret the CMA’s decision to fine us for the voluntary departure of US-based employees,” a company spokesperson said, adding that Meta would pay what is asked of it.

Facebook had announced in May 2020 this acquisition estimated at US$ 400 million (R$ 2.1 billion), the objective of which was to integrate Giphy’s immense library, which allows searching, sharing and creating animated Gif images, which are widely used. on the Internet.

In late November 2021, the British regulator ordered the American social media giant to sell its subsidiary Giphy because its merger “could harm users and advertisers of the social network in the UK”.

The CMA also feared Meta would change the criteria for accessing animated images, forcing rivals TikTok, Twitter or Snapchat “to share more user data”.