Facebook parent company Meta fined £1.5m for breaking UK rules

The penalty comes after it was fined more than £50 million in 2021 for limiting the scope of compliance reports

Facebook parent company Meta was fined for failing to notify the UK's competition watchdog of key staff changes. AFP

Facebook’s parent company Meta has been given a £1.5 million ($2.03m) fine by the UK's Competition and Markets Authority for breaching an initial enforcement order from the competition watchdog.

The CMA said it had fined Meta for the second time after it failed to alert the regulator in advance of key staff leaving the company while an investigation into a merger is under way.

A probe into Meta’s proposed purchase of GIF-sharing platform Giphy was launched by the watchdog in June 2020. It has now instructed the companies to reverse the deal.

Last October, Meta was fined more than £50 million by the CMA for significantly limiting the scope of compliance reports that were a part of the watchdog’s investigation into the Giphy purchase.

Explaining the decision to fine the technology company for a second time for breaching a CMA enforcement order, Joel Bamford, senior director of mergers at the watchdog, said Meta had “failed to alert us” of key staff changes despite “knowing they were legally required to do so”.

“Initial enforcement orders are an integral part of our mergers toolkit and ensure the CMA is able to take effective action if we find competition concerns,” he said.

“Breaches like this one threaten our ability to maintain the benefits of competition for people using these products and services.”

Facebook was rebranded as Meta in 2021 as part of its strategic pivot to becoming a virtual-reality based company.

On Thursday a historic fall in Meta's stock price erased more than $230 billion in its market value. The nosedive was easily the biggest single-day loss in history for a US company.

The wipeout happened as concerns mount over Meta’s future. On Wednesday the parent company reported its first drop in daily user figures.