As a result of a new rule mandating digital firms compensate publishers for such information, Meta on Tuesday started preventing Canadians from seeing news on Facebook and Instagram.
As additional governments attempt to force tech companies to pay for news content, Google, another opponent of the Online News Act, has stated that it is considering taking a similar action.
This is part of an ongoing worldwide dispute. “News links and content posted by news publishers and broadcasters in Canada will no longer be viewable by people in Canada,” Meta stated in a statement.
Users of Facebook and Instagram in Canada won’t be allowed to access news articles published on foreign websites, and they won’t be able to share them on those two platforms either.
According to Meta, the adjustments beginning on Tuesday will be made “over the course of the next few weeks.
Although some users claim to have already received alerts stating that such content is being restricted, an AFP reporter was still able to access news on Facebook on Tuesday.
The Online News Act, which is modeled after legislation adopted in Australia, intends to assist Canada’s beleaguered news industry, which has seen hundreds of publications shut down and a flight of advertising money over the past ten years.
It mandates that tech behemoths enter into fair economic agreements with Canadian sources for the news and information published on their platforms, or else risk becoming subject to binding arbitration.
According to a report from Canada’s parliamentary budget watchdog published in October 2022, the legislation may allow Canadian newspapers to receive roughly 330 million Canadian dollars (about 250 million US dollars) annually from digital platforms.
The legislation, according to Meta, is misguided and founded on the “incorrect premise that Meta unfairly benefits from news content shared on our platforms, when the reverse is true.
Instead, it said that news organizations post content on Facebook and Instagram to get viewers, which benefits their own financial situation.
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