(Bloomberg) -- The results of a German probe into Facebook Inc.'s user terms and website tracking will be studied with "great interest" by European Union regulators, EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said after a Prague event.
"We study it with the same great interest because of the two legs" of the German decision "both that Facebook is a dominant player in this market but also how they interpret privacy rules," Vestager told Bloomberg News. "I don't think that it can serve as a template" for EU action since the case sits "in the zone between competition law and privacy" and was partly based on German law.
Facebook's Model Attacked by German Antitrust Regulator
While Facebook was fined by the EU for a merger violation, it hasn't been targeted by an antitrust investigation into its behavior. Vestager said recently she'd "take an interest" into leaked Facebook emails that included a threat to cut off data access to a potential rival. She spoke earlier this week about the importance of monitoring data monopolies and internet gatekeepers that can choke off data access to rivals.
To contact the reporters on this story: Aoife White in Brussels at awhite62@bloomberg.net;Lenka Ponikelska in Prague at lponikelska1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Aarons at aaarons@bloomberg.net, Peter Chapman
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