Meta Faces Antitrust Challenges Amid User Lawsuits, Fines

A federal appellate court has rejected Meta users' request to immediately appeal a ruling that denied class-action status in an antitrust lawsuit against Meta, meaning the case will proceed on behalf of individual plaintiffs only. The suit alleges that Meta, through deceptive privacy practices, leveraged user data to acquire rivals like Instagram and WhatsApp, thus harming competition. Plaintiffs argued that all U.S. Facebook users were 'overcharged' because Meta would have had to pay them for their data if not for its monopoly, but this theory was previously dismissed due to insufficient supporting evidence. Meanwhile, South Korea's antitrust regulator fined Meta for failing to meet consumer protection obligations on its e-commerce platforms, such as not providing adequate dispute settlement systems and not verifying seller information. The regulator ordered Meta to address these deficiencies within 180 days to improve safety for e-commerce transactions. These developments indicate ongoing global scrutiny of Meta's business practices on both antitrust and consumer protection grounds.