Metathe parent company of Facebookis available to block the sharing of journalistic content on its platform Canada. In a blog post published on October 21 warns the Canadian government who is checking an online news law that would force digital giants to pay national media to broadcast their content. In the past, Meta had made similar comments in Australia.

Canada Blackmailed by Meta

As the Canadian Heritage Standing Committee, which is responsible for investigating the Department of Canadian Heritage’s policy, reviews the text of the Act, Facebook says it was not asked to testify. the Wall Street Journal reports the comments of Marc Dinsdale, head of media partnerships for Meta’s Canadian office, ” in the face of unfavorable legislation based on false assumptions that contradict the logic of how Facebook works, we believe it’s important to be transparent about the possibility that this is possible We are forced to remove news content sharing in Canada “.

Pablo Rodriguez, Canadian Heritage Minister, pointed this out Talks between government officials and Facebook took place just last week. He adds that ” everything we ask of tech giants like Facebook, is to negotiate fair deals with the media when they benefit from their work “. The Canadian government is convinced of that This legislation could generate $240 million a year for the media.

For its part, Meta believes that the dissemination of journalistic content on its platform allows press organizations ” 1.9 billion clicks per yearfree marketing for their content in the form of link posts valued at more than $170 million “. However, Mark Zuckerberg’s social network states in its disclosures communicates that media releases ” represent less than 3% of what people see in their News Feed Facebook and what Canadians say want to see less news and political content “.

Australia, the first victim of Facebook’s strategy

This isn’t the first time Meta has faced this situation. The Menlo Park-based company got in touch at the end of August 2021 that she would stop sharing messages on Facebook in Australia if Canberra didn’t back down. As a reminder, the Australian government wanted passed a law obliging Google and Meta to pay for journalistic content appear on their pages.

If Google showed a white paw, it’s not the case of Meta, who went for it block access to all Australian and international newspapers, but also sites from the Australian government, hospitals and ambulance services from their platform in Australia. A few days later the Australian government announces the amendment of this bill with it Facebook restores messages in Australian territory.

Whistleblowers announced this in early May Wall Street Journal the This strategy was developed by Facebook to prevent the passage of the law. They presented as evidence an email from Campbell Brown, Facebook’s Director of Partnerships, congratulating her teams: ” We got exactly where we wanted “. For Pablo Rodríguez, Facebook reproduces the exact same pattern in Canada. He affirms that ” [Meta] continues to draw inspiration from the method used in Australia “to come to an end.

Similar debates were also held in France. A Neighboring Rights Act, allowing press organizations to be compensated like Canada for distributing their content, has been passed Presented April 2019 and introduced into French law in October. Negotiations between Facebook and the General News Press Alliance, which represents 284 publishers, have taken place ended on October 21, 2021 after two years of talks.