Meta starts picking news content from Canadian Facebook and Instagram

At the beginning of the month, Meta, Facebook’s parent company, made it clear that it would remove all news content from Facebook and Instagram in Canada if the proposed Online News Act was passed by the government. As soon as the Canadian Parliament approved the act on Thursday, Meta confirmed that it would follow through on its threat.

The Online News Act aims to tackle the significant decline in advertising revenue that Canadian news organizations have faced over the last twenty years. It mandates tech giants like Google and Meta to negotiate reimbursement plans with news outlets for sharing their stories on their platforms.

In response to government oversight, Meta has decided to take a stand by removing news features in certain markets, such as Australia in 2021. Despite these actions, the company promises that other aspects of the Facebook experience will not be affected.

Google, another company affected by the bill, has not announced any plans to cut service in Canada yet. However, it started testing ways to block news access in the country earlier this year. Google’s spokesperson expressed their efforts to find a solution with the government to avoid undesirable outcomes.