French antitrust watchdog orders Meta to resume talks with media groups over publishing fees

Reuters

Wed, July 8, 2026 astatine 4:56 AM CDT 1 min read

PARIS, July 8 (Reuters) - France's contention authorization connected Wednesday ordered Meta Platforms to resume talks with French ‌media groups implicit payments for publishing content, aft the ‌publishers complained pursuing the illness of erstwhile negotiations.

The lawsuit is 1 of ​a increasing fig betwixt publishers and tech companies implicit the usage of contented published connected societal media oregon utilized for AI grooming that person triggered litigation.

The French authorization said it ‌found the practices employed ⁠by Meta successful its methods of calculating fees were apt to represent an maltreatment of ⁠its ascendant position, and it ordered the Facebook proprietor to enactment guardant details of its outgo program wrong 15 days.

In the ​European ​Union, "neighbouring rights" let people media ​outlets to question remuneration for ‌the integer usage of their content.

A erstwhile statement betwixt Meta and property associations DVP and APIG, whose members see the newspapers Les Echos and Le Monde, expired successful 2024 and the 2 sides person since failed to hold connected ‌the magnitude due, meaning the French ​media person received nary payments.

"We are ​not dealing with ​a concern wherever determination is simply a refusal to ‌negotiate. Rather, the dialog is ​taking spot nether ​conditions wherever determination is simply a refusal to see an alternate methodology oregon to stock the information required for ​that alternate methodology," ‌Benoit Coeure, president of the antitrust authority, told reporters.

(Reporting ​by Forrest Crellin and Dominique Vidalon, Editing by ​Dominique Patton and Barbara Lewis)