ByteDance, which owns Meta and TikTok, is not keen on the idea of paying the European Union to regulate them. The companies objected to the moderation fee set by EU moderators, who are now required to monitor Meta, TikTok and other major platforms under the Digital Services Act (DSA), Politico reported. Meta first announced its action, and a day later ByteDance followed suit.
Under the current arrangement, all designated companies must fork over €45.2 million ($48.7 million) which EU regulators say is needed to properly police 20 Very Large Online Platforms and two Very Large Online Search Engines (VLOSEs). . Each regulated platform has 45 million or more users, with the financial contribution depending on the size of that number. They also can’t owe more than 0.05 percent of 2022 net profits. However, companies that report little or no profit, such as Amazon and Pinterest, have no debt. Meta, on the other hand, received a bill of 11 million euros ($11.9 million) under the current regulation. ByteDance has not publicly disclosed how much it owes.
Meta challenges European Union regulators’ methodology for selecting each company’s fees. A Meta spokesperson said: “Currently companies that post losses do not have to pay even if they have a large user base or pose a larger regulatory burden; This means that some companies pay nothing, leaving others to pay a disproportionate amount of the total amount.” said. Failure to comply with the fee could lead to a fine of up to six percent of the company’s global revenue.