BRUSSELS, Feb 9 — European Union (EU) competition regulators have threatened to stop Meta Platforms from blocking artificial intelligence rivals from its WhatsApp messaging service while it investigates suspected abuse of a dominant position by the United States (US) tech giant.
On Monday, the European Commission (EC) said it had sent a statement of objections, or charges, to Meta over violations of the bloc's rules and intended to impose interim measures to prevent serious and irreparable harm to rivals, mirroring moves by Italy's competition watchdog in December last year.
"We must protect effective competition in this vibrant field, which means we cannot allow dominant tech companies to illegally leverage their dominance to give themselves an unfair advantage.
"That is why we are considering quickly imposing interim measures on Meta, to preserve access for competitors to WhatsApp while the investigation is ongoing and avoid Meta's new policy irreparably harming competition in Europe," EU antitrust chief Teresa Ribera said in a statement.
In response, Meta said there was no reason for the EU to intervene.
"There are many AI options and people can use them from app stores, operating systems, devices, websites and industry partnerships.
"The Commission's logic incorrectly assumes the WhatsApp Business API (software) is a key distribution channel for these chatbots," a Meta spokesman said in an email.
Meta implemented its policy on January 15, allowing only its Meta AI assistant on WhatsApp.
The EC's decision on whether to impose interim measures will depend on Meta's reply and rights of defence. The EU investigation underscores the bloc's determination to enforce its antitrust rules despite US criticism of European action against big US technology companies.
A Brazilian court suspended an interim measure by the country's antitrust agency against Meta last month on the same issue.
