The European Commission revealed Meta It intends to impose “interim measures” to prevent the tech giant from removing third-party AI assistants from WhatsApp.
The EU notified the company on Monday of its preliminary opinion that the company had “violated” EU antitrust laws. The investigation is ongoing and any action is subject to Mehta’s right to answer and defend himself, the European Commission said.
Teresa Rivera, the bloc’s competition commissioner, said the move would protect “effective competition” and prevent “dominant technology companies from illegally exploiting their advantages to gain unfair advantages.”
“The AI market is evolving rapidly, so we need to act quickly, too. We are therefore considering quickly imposing interim measures against Meta in order to preserve our competitors’ access to WhatsApp while the investigation is ongoing and to avoid Meta’s new policies having an irreversible negative impact on competition in Europe,” she added.
Meta announced updates to the WhatsApp Business Solutions Terms in October that “effectively” banned third-party general-purpose AI assistants from the application, according to the commission. The policy took effect in January.
A spokesperson for the European Commission told CNBC that as an interim measure, it will ask Meta to maintain access to WhatsApp by third-party AI assistants under the terms of the policy change while the investigation continues.
“The fact is that there is no reason for the EU to interfere with the WhatsApp Business API,” a Meta spokesperson said.
“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 that the WhatsApp Business API is the primary distribution channel for these chatbots,” they added.
Major US tech companies face hefty fines for violating EU rules in 2025.
In April, Apple was found to have breached anti-steering obligations and was fined 500 million euros.
In the same month, Meta was fined €200 million for breaching its obligation to give consumers a choice of services that use less personal data.
In September, the European Commission fined Google 2.95 billion euros for antitrust violations related to online advertising.
