Facebook was dealt another blow to its business interests this week when the EU’s European Commission accused the company of abusing its massive market position and breaking antitrust laws. According to the Commission’s findings, Facebook has not given its competitors or its users a fair choice when it comes to online selling because it has disproportionately promoted Facebook Marketplace. The regulators also expressed concern that Facebook may be inappropriately using its access to data.

“Our preliminary concern is that Meta ties its dominant social network Facebook to its online classified ad services called Facebook Marketplace,” said Margrethe Vestager, the European Commission’s executive VP for competition policy. “This means Facebook users have no choice but to have access to Facebook Marketplace. Furthermore, we are concerned that Meta imposed unfair trading conditions, allowing it to use of data on competing online classified ad services. If confirmed, Meta’s practices would be illegal under our competition rules.”

While this may not seem like the biggest deal to everyday users, cases like this are indicative of how Facebook has far too much power to control what we can and can’t see on the platform. Not only does it hurt businesses, but it hurts our overall ability to communicate freely online.

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