Meta Bans News Content in Canada Over New ‘Online News Act’

Meta has announced the next stage of its opposition to the Canadian Government’s Online News Act, which will now see Canadian publishers banned from Facebook and Instagram, in order to avoid fees and charges associated with their access to Meta’s apps.

Canada’s Online News Act ostensibly aims to address imbalances in the local news ecosystem, by forcing large online platforms, like Meta and Google, to pay publishers for news content that’s shared across their platforms. But both Meta and Google have pushed back, saying that the proposed regulations don’t accurately reflect the state of the modern news ecosystem.

But the Canadian Government is pushing ahead anyway, which has now led to this next step.

As explained by Meta: