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A Meta lawyer told the Commission today that it can lower its EU subscription fees to €5.99 for a single account and charge €4 for every additional account.
Meta has offered to lower the price of its ad-free subscription model for Facebook and Instagram in the EU market.
In a hearing with the European Commission today (19 March), the company said that it can bring the fees for the ad-free tier in the EU from €9.99 to €5.99, according to Reuters.
Meta first shared plans to introduce an ad-free paid tier for Instagram and Facebook in the EU in October last year to address EU privacy concerns without taking a hit financially. However, the move – which would give EU users a choice between ad-enabled free services and ad-free premium services – was not well received by privacy rights activists.
Max Schrems, the privacy rights advocate who set up the non-profit NYOB (None of Your Business), said in a statement at the time that fundamental rights “cannot be for sale”.
“Are we going to pay for the right to vote or the right to free speech next? This would mean that only the rich can enjoy these rights, at a time when many people are struggling to make ends meet,” he said. “Introducing this idea in the area of your right to data protection is a major shift. We would fight this up and down the courts.”
Meta lawyer Tim Lamb told the hearing today that the price drop applies to a single account and EU users will be charged €4 for any additional accounts.
“That is by far the lowest end of the range that any reasonable person should be paying for services of this quality. And I think that is a serious offer. The regulatory uncertainty at the moment is out there and it needs to settle down quickly.”
NOYB said in October that the move by Meta followed successful litigation by the non-profit in which the European Data Protection Board and the Court of Justice of the European Union declared the tech giant’s so-called “consent bypass” practices illegal.
Just last month, this ‘consent-or-pay’ model was under fresh fire from eight consumer groups from the European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) network, which filed complaints with their national data protection authorities against Meta, including in Spain, France, Denmark and Greece.
Ursula Pachl, deputy director general of BEUC, said at the time the new model is Meta’s latest effort to justify “massive commercial surveillance” on its users.
“Meta’s offer to consumers is smoke and mirrors to cover up what is, at its core, the same old hoovering up of all kinds of sensitive information about people’s lives which it then monetises through its invasive advertising model,” she said.
“Surveillance-based business models pose all kinds of problems under the GDPR and it’s time for data protection authorities to stop Meta’s unfair data processing and its infringing of people’s fundamental rights.”
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