After what we thought would be anxious anticipation for many, it seems that Facebook and Instagram won’t be shut down in Europe after all. Early last month, the future for Meta in Europe seemed to suddenly be bleak after the platform shared this note in an update to the SEC:
“In August 2020, we received a preliminary draft decision from the Irish Data Protection Commission (IDPC) that preliminarily concluded that Meta Platforms Ireland’s reliance on Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) in respect of European user data does not achieve compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and preliminarily proposed that such transfers of user data from the European Union to the United States should therefore be suspended. If a new transatlantic data transfer framework is not adopted and we are unable to continue to rely on SCCs or rely upon other alternative means of data transfers from Europe to the United States, we will likely be unable to offer a number of our most significant products and services, including Facebook and Instagram, in Europe.”
Sigh of Relief
As was noted, this was not something new – The EU privacy regulator sent Meta a preliminary order back in 2020 ordering it to suspend data transfers to the US, in line with GDPR provisions. Since then, Meta has been working on a solution to ensure full transparency on risk. This time, however, may be due to certain wording, Meta was forced to issue an official response, stating that it has “no desire to withdraw from Europe”.
Now, this ‘disagreement’ of sorts appears to be even less of an issue given that the president of the EU Commission just announced a new preliminary agreement on transatlantic data flow with the US. In turn, this new development trivialized all the tension between Meta and the EU regulatory board prior, with the risk of the EU going dark on the most widely-used social platform, an inconvenience at most.
The Wrap
Surprisingly, at the time, many Europeans weren’t too phased by the thought of living in a ‘Facebook-Free’ world. Many seemingly welcome it. One Bloomberg report states:
“After being hacked I’ve lived without Facebook and Twitter for four years and life has been fantastic,” German Economy Minister Robert Habeck told reporters at an event alongside French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire in Paris on Monday. “I can confirm that life is very good without Facebook and that we would live very well without Facebook,” Le Maire added.”
It’d certainly be interesting to see what a world without Facebook and Instagram looks like, allowing us to gauge just how much impact they had. Then again, many of those who’ve become reliant on their services would likely experience negative consequences should these channels be taken out of the picture. At this point, at least, everything becomes mostly educational, allowing Europeans to either lament or relax at what could have been.
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