Paris appeals court has rejected Meta’s challenge to emergency orders that require it to resume talks with French news publishers over payment for their content, Reuters reported on Thursday.
France’s competition authority, the Autorité de la concurrence, imposed the interim measures in July after talks between Meta and the publishers broke down. The Facebook and Instagram owner appealed in August.
The orders say Meta must hold fair talks with publishers about paying for news used across its apps. It must also tell publishers how much money its social networks make and how they use news content.
In addition, Meta must not make news content less visible on its platforms while the case continues.
Two groups brought the complaints, according to trade site PPC Land. APIG speaks for more than 300 newspapers, while DVP collects payments for publishers and news agencies.
In its ruling, the court said Meta’s practices could amount to an abuse of a dominant position, which French and EU law forbid. It pointed in particular to the way Meta works out what it pays publishers.
The ruling covers only the temporary orders, however. The competition authority has not yet decided whether Meta actually broke the law, and the orders stay in place while its case goes on.
Meta said it was disappointed with the ruling, Reuters reported. It added that it would keep following the orders and talking in good faith, and hoped publishers would do the same.
The dispute turns on so-called neighbouring rights. Under EU copyright rules, these let publishers ask for payment when platforms reuse their journalism.
When the authority issued the orders in July, it called Meta’s method of calculating payments a probable abuse of its market power. If a final ruling confirms that, Meta could face fines.
Google has already paid a high price in a similar dispute. In 2024, the authority fined Google €250m for breaking commitments it had made to French publishers. Part of that case concerned Google training its Bard chatbot on news content without telling publishers.
Meta also faces pressure elsewhere in Europe, where publishers have asked regulators to stop its AI terms .
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