Meta Previews Ad Free Services in EU to Address AdTech Privacy Concerns

Meta appears to be rolling out subscription-based ad-free social media platform services in an effort to avoid having to fit its extremely lucrative advertising business to EU privacy laws. Several news outlets report that Meta would allow users to pay for ad-free services, or use an advertising-supported service, at the election of the user. The choice for ad-free would, Meta hopes, constitute a valid consent to continue to send advertising to those users. The Wall Street Journal reported in early October that Meta is pitching the plans to EU privacy and antitrust regulators.

Why It Matters

Adtech -- cookies and other trackers -- has been much under fire for privacy reasons in the last year or two. Google and Facebook together have been fined billions of euros for privacy violations in the EU, largely relating to trackers and data gathering without consent. In the US, such technologies are being used to push novel claims like wiretapping. Not all trackers are used in advertising, but the impact of advertising for operators is massive -- and anything that curtails or slows down that revenue has an outsized impact. If Meta can convince regulators that a choice between free or paid services is a meaningful way to handle privacy concerns such as user consent to receive ads and allow their data to be transferred outside the EU, it could mean smoother sailing for adtech generally.