The CMA has opened an investigation under the Competition Act 1998 into whether requiring businesses to accept Meta’s proposed terms amounts to an unlawful imposition of unfair trading conditions. Meta has paused the rollout of the terms pending a consultation with industry groups, and its existing terms remain in place.

The PPA has engaged with the CMA on the issue alongside coalition partners, and will submit evidence gathered from members to support its investigation.

What Meta proposed

Under the proposed terms, any business using Meta’s products would be taken to authorise Meta, and anyone acting on its behalf, to crawl its websites and use the content to develop Meta’s “advertising and business products”. The permission would extend well beyond the pages needed for link previews or advertising, and the purposes are broad enough to include AI.

There was no way to opt out. The only alternative was to stop all business use of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads, which is not a realistic option for publishers. Meta has said publishers can still use robots.txt to signal their preferences, but that assurance does not appear in the terms.

Sajeeda Merali, CEO, PPA said:

“Access to audiences should not come at the price of publishers’ content. Meta is central to how publishers win subscribers, engage audiences and deliver for advertisers, which is exactly why the proposed terms are so concerning.

Our members’ evidence shows that, although traffic from Meta has declined, their presence on it has not. Publishers invest heavily in trusted, high-quality content, and they should have a genuine say in whether and how it is used by others. Where their content is used beyond what is needed to provide Meta’s services, it should be licensed on fair terms, not taken as a condition of access.

We welcome the CMA’s investigation and Meta’s decision to pause its changes. The PPA will keep sharing our members’ evidence and engaging with all parties as the process continues, and we look forward to working with the CMA to secure a fair outcome.”

The PPA is asking the CMA to ensure the terms are not implemented while it investigates, and that any revised terms separate access to Meta’s services from consent to crawling, give publishers enforceable control over how their content is used, and protect their existing rights. The PPA is also calling for an SMS investigation into Meta under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024.

For more information on our work please contact eilidh.wilson@ppa.co.uk