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Meta threatens to shut down Facebook and Instagram in Europe

The social networking giant has reiterated the possibility of shutting down its most important services on the Old Continent if it cannot transfer its users' data to its servers in the United States.

The Meta group is trying to put pressure on Europe. In its annual report to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Facebook's parent company warned once again that it could "probably" no longer offer its "most important products and services", such as Facebook and Instagram, in Europe if a new framework to regulate the transfer of data from users of its services to its servers in the United States is not adopted or if the company is no longer authorised to use the current agreements "or alternatives", reports the City A.M. media.

"Sharing data between countries or regions of the world is crucial to offering our services and targeted advertising", the company insists. It wishes to process users' personal data on US soil, outside the protection framework provided by the EU with the stricter RGPD.

The group previously used the transatlantic transfer framework known as Privacy Shield, but this treaty was annulled by the Court of Justice of the European Union in 2020, due to data protection violations. The EU, which believes that people's data is less protected across the Atlantic, and the US have since been working on a new version of the treaty. Facebook, whose revenues and users are in decline, is currently under investigation by the Irish data protection regulator.

Text by 20minutes.ch (man)

Blackout Tuesday, a counter-productive initiative?

Launched by the American music industry, this movement in support of anti-racism demonstrators following the death of George Floyd has had unexpected effects. Particularly on Instagram, where black screens have tended to drown out information about the Black Lives Matter movement.

Many Instagram users have noticed that their feed is full of black squares posted on their followers' accounts as a sign of support for the demonstrators against racism and police violence in the United States.

This phenomenon is part of the Blackout Tuesday movement, which itself stemmed "essentially from the #TheShowMustBePaused initiative" launched by a section of the American music industry in reaction to the death of George Floyd, as Variety points out.

The problem, according to this magazine specialising in entertainment news, is that by also using the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter (#BlackLivesMatter) to accompany their black screens, social network users ultimately "also prevented the circulation of important information about the demonstrations, fundraising and other issues crucial to the movement".

"The intention was good at the outset, but, to put it bluntly, this clearly harms the message," tweeted one activist quoted by Variety, while other users have issued calls to abandon the use of #BlackLivesMatter in this form on Instagram

Source: Courrier International