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TECHNOLOGY

Germany welcomes Meta plan for ‘more transparent’ data use

Germany's Federal Cartel Office on Wednesday hailed a move by Facebook owner Meta to give users greater say in how their personal data gets used across its different platforms such as WhatsApp and Instagram.

Published: 7 June 2023 17:31 CEST
The Meta logo on a smartphone and a computer monitor.
The Meta logo on a smartphone and a computer monitor. Photo: picture alliance/dpa/SOPA Images via ZUMA Press Wire | Pavlo Gonchar

The so-called “accounts centre” will allow users “for the first time to make a largely free and informed decision about whether they want to use Meta’s services separately or in combined form”, the Federal Cartel Office said in a statement.

The watchdog, which has been locked in a long-running spat with Meta over privacy and antitrust concerns, hailed the action as “an important step”.

The Federal Cartel Office in 2019 ordered Meta, then still called Facebook, to stop merging user data collected through its subsidiaries and other websites unless users gave their consent.

The social media giant objected to the decision, sparking a legal battle that has ended up before the European Court of Justice. The ECJ is expected to announce its ruling next month.

READ ALSO: Germany steps of monitoring of Facebook’s Meta

The Federal Cartel Office said it has remained in talks with Meta throughout the litigation process to find a way forward.

After rejecting Meta’s first proposed “accounts centre” as “seriously deficient”, the watchdog said the US company made changes that made the overview “significantly more transparent and comprehensible”.

That included using clearer language and simplifying the process to separate accounts if users wished to do so.

Customers will now have the choice to use Meta’s platforms separately, or link them to benefit from extras such as cross-posting — where the same post is published on several social media websites at the same time.

This option, however, will involve more personal-data sharing which Meta would use for advertising purposes, the regulator said.

Meta told AFP its move was aimed at “making it simpler and more convenient for people and businesses to access new experiences and communicate across Facebook’s family of apps”.

The Federal Cartel Office last year classed Meta as a company of “paramount significance for competition”, allowing for closer monitoring for possible abuse of its market position.

Fellow tech behemoths Amazon, Apple and Google parent Alphabet have also been placed under increased scrutiny, made possible by new German legislation.

The German Competition Act, which came into force in 2021, gives the Federal Cartel Office greater powers to clamp down on anti-competitive behaviour by tech giants.

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PRACTICAL TIPS

How customers in Germany will receive money back for faulty cell phone coverage

A legal right to help consumers experiencing poor mobile phone networks is set to become available this year. How exactly does it work?

Published: 12 February 2024 12:56 CET
How customers in Germany will receive money back for faulty cell phone coverage

In recent years, Germany has become so notorious for its faulty cell phone coverage – even within some urban centres – that the word Funklochrepublik (mobile dead zone republic) has often been nominated as the country’s word of the year. 

READ ALSO: New map shows Germany’s ‘mobile dead zones’

While the “mobile phone reduction right” (Mobilfunk-Minderungsrecht) – which gives customers the right to money back should their mobile network not be as fast as promised by the provider – has been in force since the end of 2021, the tool needed to enforce it hasn’t been available.

But that’s set to change this year: the Federal Network Agency has announced that it intends to make the monitoring tool (Messtool or Überwachungsmechanismus, surveillance mechanism) available in 2024, it told DPA.

How can customers receive a reduction?

In December 2021, Germany’s revised Telecommunications Act came into force, strengthening the position of consumers vis-à-vis their internet providers. 

In the product information sheet for mobile phone contracts, providers must state the estimated maximum download and upload speed.

If there are “significant, continuous or regularly recurring deviations” between the contractually agreed and actual performance, the consumer is entitled to an early cancellation or a lower monthly payment. Most phone contracts normally last a minimum of two years.

According to the law, the Network Agency needed to create a monitoring tool to determine the entitlement to a reduction, which it’s already doing for landlines (Festnetz). Consumers can carry out corresponding tests at breitbandmessung.de, although these are time-consuming and have barely been used.

Photo by John Tuesday on Unsplash

If the customer then confirms that their coverage isn’t up to par, they can contract the provider with these measurements and request for a reduction.

If the provider refuses to comply, the case would go to the local court – where the consumer would have a good chance of winning their case on the basis of their measurement report.

How exactly is the right to a reduction determined?

A total of 30 measurements spread over five days will be required for a right to a reduction.

At least 25 percent of the estimated maximum transmission speed must be achieved in urban areas, 15 percent in semi-urban areas and 10 percent in rural areas. 

This means that anyone strolling through the centre of a large city who has been promised a maximum download speed of 100 megabits per second, according to the product information sheet of their mobile phone contract, must have a data transfer rate of at least 25 megabits.

How are mobile companies reacting?

Industry representatives are skeptical about these measurements, which they say are more demanding than a landline network.

“The mobile provider has no direct influence on the customer’s connection quality, which depends on various factors such as the customer’s location, network utilisation in the cell or even the weather,” said Frederic Ufer from the Internet industry association VATM. 

Telecommunications providers are also less than enthusiastic about the right to reduce charges. They point out that they have invested billions in expanding their networks and that these are constantly improving. 

This can’t be denied: as a whole, landline and mobile phone networks are expanding their coverage in many parts of Germany, with 5G even being rolled out in many regions.

In some places, however, there remains lack of coverage – and if you live or work in one of these areas, it is of little benefit to you that network expansion in Germany is on average improving.

Consumer advocates criticise a discrepancy between appearance and reality: contracts too often promise far too much, says Flosbach. 

Time and again, German residents have contacted the consumer advice centre and complained about deficits in the mobile phone network. 

“So far, they haven’t been able to get out of their contract early, even if it’s hardly any use to them and they need a contract with a different network operator in order to have good connections where they live or work.” 

Early cancellations or lower monthly payments would be a means of putting pressure on providers to expand more in sparsely populated areas, said Flosbach.

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