US competition watchdog to sue Facebook again

Facebook was sued by the FTC and lawyers in 46 U.S. states late last year. In addition to buying potential competitors over the years, CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s company also did this by imposing conditions on software developers, which made it much harder to compete with Facebook. In addition, Facebook denied access to certain information to developers.

In June, however, the judge went with Facebook’s arguments that there was very little evidence of cartel practices. The regulator was given a month to come up with further evidence. Facebook does not want FTC’s new top woman Lena Khan to look into the matter. The company believes Khan is biased because he previously published as a researcher on social media and served on the delegation that investigates the technology company.

Monopoly

According to the FTC, Facebook has had a monopoly on personal social networks in the United States since 2011. The indictment has been partially amended and will not be made public for the next ten days at the request of the Comptroller. FTC believes Facebook violated competition rules by acquiring social media site Instagram in 2012 and WhatsApp news service in 2014 because it removed them as competitors.

Facebook has responded that the new tariffs are unsubstantiated and that the company will continue to vehemently oppose them. According to Facebook, there is no monopoly and the FTC is trying to rewrite the competition law with the new indictment. The FTC said Khan would continue to be involved in the case.