The European Commission on Thursday fined US social media giant Facebook EUR 110 million ($120 million or roughly Rs. 773 crores) for providing incorrect and misleading information on its takeover of WhatsApp.
"Today's decision sends a clear signal to companies that they must comply with all aspects of EU merger rules, including the obligation to provide correct information," EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager[1] said in a statement.
"The Commission must be able to take decisions about mergers' effects on competition in full knowledge of accurate facts," Vestager said.
Facebook said in response that it cooperated with the Commission and that the errors made were not intentional.
"We've acted in good faith since our very first interactions with the Commission and we've sought to provide accurate information at every turn," a Facebook[2] spokesperson said.
"The errors we made in our 2014 filings were not intentional and the Commission has confirmed that they did not impact the outcome of the merger review. Today's announcement brings this matter to a close."
EU regulators cleared the then $19 billion Facebook acquisition of WhatsApp[3] in late 2014, finding no reason to believe it would dampen competition in the burgeoning social media sector.
In its statement Thursday, the Commission recalled that the merger rules require companies to provide regulators with the accurate information essential to any review.
It noted that when Facebook notified the Commission of the acquisition in 2014, the company had said it would "be unable to establish reliable automated matching between Facebook users' accounts and WhatsApp users' accounts".
"However, in August 2016, WhatsApp announced updates to its terms of service and privacy policy[4], including the possibility of linking WhatsApp users'...