Meta is already considering closing most of its services in the European Union as a possibility, if it is not allowed to manage user data as it has done until now.
Currently, the activity of Facebook, Instagram and other Meta services is protected by Privacy Shield, an agreement between the United States and the European Union for the secure transfer of data between both powers. In this way, Facebook can manage and store the data of European users on servers located in the United States, where the legislation is much more permissive.
However, the terms of the agreement have been harshly criticized by European regulators, who believe that it is being abused to violate the privacy of users, taking advantage of the fact that US laws are not as harsh as European ones.
In July 2020, the Court of Justice of the European Union had the same opinion, of the Privacy Shield; however, the effects of this decision are up in the air and Privacy Shield can still be used, while European and US legislators work on a new version that conforms to privacy laws. But Meta has already warned that it may simply decide to leave Europe if those new rules are too different.
The warning is hidden in the bittersweet Meta results released last week, which for the first time revealed a huge loss for investment dedicated to VR and metaverse. There Meta states that if it cannot use the same clauses it now uses to obtain permission to transfer data to the United States, it will be “unable to offer some of our most significant products, such as Facebook and Instagram, in Europe.”
In addition, the company has made a public statement, signed by its Vice President of Global Affairs and former British Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, in which it calls on regulators to adopt a “pragmatic” position on the way data is managed. of the Europeans; he believes regulators should “minimize disruption to the thousands of businesses that, like Facebook, rely on these mechanisms to transfer data.” The company has also recalled that it plans to create up to 10,000 jobs with the migration to the metaverse.
Now, in response to press releases, Meta has made a new public statement in which it clarifies that it has “no desire or plans to leave Europe”, it is just that “the simple reality is that Meta, and many other organizations and businesses, depends on data transfers between the EU and the US”. For this reason, it affirms that it is “closely monitoring” the potential impact of the new rules.
It is not clear how this measure would affect WhatsApp, a very popular service in European countries such as Spain; Although it does not capture as much user data as the rest of Meta’s services, it is no secret that in the future the company wants to unite all its platforms into a single one to be presented by Mark Zuckerberg last year.
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