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Facebook in EU antitrust crosshairs over data collection

The EU executive said it had sent out questionnaires as part of preliminary investigations into both Facebook and Googles data.

The move underlines regulators concerns regarding the massive amount of data held by tech giants and how they may leverage this to block competitors and expand into new sectors.

These investigations concern the way data is gathered, processed, used and monetized including for advertising purposes, the EU competition enforcer said, without providing details.

A questionnaire seen by Reuters showed the Commission zooming in on Facebooks application programming interface that allows app developers to access data or functionalities on its platform and its photo-sharing site Instagram and software components to interact.

Regulators wanted to know details of the contracts allowing companies access to Facebooks APIs and the impact on companies if they were not allowed to use such data.

The questionnaire asked whether there were any restrictions or conditions on Facebooks use of data provided by the companies in return for access to its APIs, and if Facebook curbs access and the reason for it.

Original article
Author: Foo Yun Chee

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Foo Yun Chee has recently written 11 articles on similar topics including :
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  10. "Facebook and Belgium's privacy watchdog sparred on Monday at Europe's top court over which data protection authority has the power to police the U.S. social media giant in a case that could escalate its privacy fights across the EU". (October 5, 2020)
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