After announcing its latest developments in the field of virtual reality, Facebook faces a new hurdle in the US: A new lawsuit, this time filed by the US Federal Trade Commission (FCT).
The agency accuses the social network of violating the country’s “antitrust” law by acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp for US $ 1 billion and US $ 19 billion, respectively.
The FCT claims that Mark Zuckerberg’s company maintains an illegal monopoly. The most radical result of the case will be that the US justice demands the sale of the two platforms.
In short, the heart of the complaint is: Facebook would have dominated the US social media market. In response, a Facebook spokesperson issued the following note:
“It is unfortunate that even though the court rejected the complaint and found it to be without merit for a claim, the FTC decided to continue this unsubstantiated process.”
Finally, the company reinforces that the acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp were “reviewed and approved many years ago.”
Facebook will compensate a Brazilian client for the WhatsApp scam.
In addition to the new controversy in the land of Uncle Sam, the São Paulo Court also ordered Facebook (and the operator Vivo) to compensate a client whose phone line was cloned to apply scams through WhatsApp.
The client claimed that the fraud occurred due to a flaw in Vivo’s system, which would have allowed him to clone his account on the messenger.
The São Paulo Court of Justice (TJ-SP) issued a public note warning about the increase in the number of cases of this type:
“Be careful with money requests and codes sent by WhatsApp. Scammers use online data and photos to create a fraudulent profile of the courier. “
Another helpful piece of advice is: always be wary of messages that say: “I changed my cell phone.”