EU Considering Interim Measures Against Meta
The European Commission is considering imposing interim measures against Meta in connection with its ongoing investigation into WhatsApp’s AI integration rules. According to EU antitrust officials, the Commission is assessing whether recent changes to WhatsApp’s business terms could result in unlawful restrictions on third-party AI providers.
Focus of the Investigation
In late 2025, Meta updated the conditions for accessing the WhatsApp Business API. The revised policy significantly limits the ability of external artificial intelligence services to operate within the WhatsApp ecosystem. While Meta continues to allow basic customer-service chatbots, the policy blocks advanced AI tools and prohibits the use of WhatsApp-related data to train or improve external machine-learning models.
At the same time, Meta’s own AI assistants and internal AI infrastructure remain exempt from these restrictions. Regulators consider this a potential case of self-preferencing and an abuse of a dominant market position.
Why Interim Measures Are Being Considered
The Commission is evaluating whether immediate action is necessary to prevent what it calls “irreparable harm to competition” in the rapidly developing European AI services market. Interim measures would act as temporary restrictions or corrective orders that remain in place while the full investigation proceeds.
Such measures are typically considered in cases where the suspected anticompetitive conduct could permanently alter market conditions or limit innovation if allowed to continue unchecked.
EU competition law prohibits dominant market operators from using their position to block or disadvantage competing technologies. Regulators are particularly concerned about the following issues:
- Platform gatekeeping: Whether Meta is using its control over WhatsApp, one of Europe’s most widely used communication channels, to prevent competing AI solutions from gaining user access.
- Data access limitations: The degree to which Meta’s policy restricts third parties from training their systems on data generated inside WhatsApp while reserving this capability for its own products.
- Market distortion: The possibility that smaller AI providers could be locked out of a critical market before they have the chance to develop viable alternatives.
This investigation highlights the increasing regulatory focus on AI access, infrastructure control, and competitive neutrality in digital markets.
Meta disputes the allegations and maintains that the WhatsApp platform was never intended for large-scale AI model training. The company argues that capacity limits, operational risks, and data-protection concerns make such restrictions necessary. It says users continue to have broad access to AI services through other applications and platforms outside WhatsApp.
Implications for the Industry
The case is being closely watched by AI developers, corporate compliance officers, and in-house legal teams for several reasons:
- Regulatory precedent: Any interim measures could set a benchmark for future enforcement actions against digital platforms integrating generative AI.
- AI governance strategy: Organizations deploying AI tools in Europe may face new expectations around access fairness, interoperability, and non-discriminatory platform policies.
- Data usage boundaries: The Commission is likely to evaluate not only competition aspects but also the relationship between platform data and AI training, which directly affects compliance frameworks.
The Commission has not provided a timeline for a decision on interim measures. The investigation will continue while regulators collect market evidence the EU views as necessary to determine whether Meta’s conduct violates competition law.
In the broader context of European digital regulation, the case underscores a clear trend: AI deployments by dominant platforms are now subject to close antitrust scrutiny. Legal teams should expect increased transparency requirements, potential disclosure obligations regarding AI training data, and greater regulatory oversight of platform governance decisions.
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