Meta must ease access to non-profiled timeline: Dutch court

The Amsterdam court said Meta currently switches the preferences back to a curated feed whenever a user closes the app or moves to a different section of the platform.

“Facebook and Instagram do not sufficiently empower Dutch citizens to make free and autonomous choices about the use of profiled recommendation systems,” said the court in its judgement.

The court gave Meta two weeks to ensure users have access to a different timeline — for example in chronological order — if they wish.

User preferences must also be retained, rather than automatically switched back to a profiled timeline, the court said.

The case was brought by privacy pressure group Bits of Freedom, which successfully argued that Meta’s practices infringed the EU’s Digital Services Act.

Bits of Freedom brought the case in the run-up to Dutch elections on October 29.

The court said the proximity of the vote “partly” explained its order to change the system within two weeks.

Meta faces a fine of 100,000 ($117,450) euros every day it fails to comply with the court order, up to a maximum of five million euros.

“We fundamentally disagree with this decision and will appeal,” a Meta spokesperson responded to AFP.

“We introduced substantial changes to our systems to meet our regulatory obligations under the DSA, and notified users in the Netherlands about how they can use our tools to experience our platforms without personalization,” the spokesperson said.

“We continue to engage extensively with the European Commission, our DSA regulator in Europe, and believe this is a matter for them — not one to be litigated in individual courts in member states.

“The DSA is designed to create consistency in the way tech companies are held to account and preserve the harmonious way people experience our platforms across the EU. Proceedings like this threaten the digital single market and the harmonized regulatory regime that should underpin it.”