Meta is taking another step forward in its fight with Brussels. The company announced today that it will not deploy its new generative artificial intelligence (AI) models in Europe, which are capable of generating content from written instructions. The decision is a response to what Menlo Park considers to be excessive interference by the EU in its industry through the complex European regulatory framework.
“We will be launching a multimodal Llama model in the coming months, but not in the EU due to the unpredictable nature of the European regulatory environment,” a spokesperson for the tech giant said in a statement. The new version of Llama will be able to process video, audio, text and images and can be used from a mobile phone or from Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.
Although the Llama model will be released under an open license, European companies will not be able to use it. Likewise, companies outside the EU that incorporate this tool will not be able to offer services related to it in European territory. What Meta will launch in the EU, according to company sources, is a text-only version of its Llama 3 model.
The decision by the company founded by Mark Zuckerberg comes just days after Meta itself renounced using data from its Facebook or Instagram users to train its AI models. This move, in turn, was prompted by the investigation opened on the matter by the data protection authority of Ireland, the country in which Meta has its European headquarters.
Apple, for its part, said a month ago that it will not deploy all the new AI-based features it is working on in Europe, considering that some of their characteristics could conflict with European regulations.
One more disagreement
The multinational held meetings with members of the Commission to explain what its new data collection policy would be like for training its AI. It also informed users how they could refuse to have their data used in such training, a process that many commentators have described as extremely cumbersome. All of this would have influenced the decision not to deploy its advanced AI models in Europe.
Just two weeks ago, the European Commission accused Meta of violating the Digital Markets Act (DMA) with its “pay or consent” model, under which users of Facebook and Instagram, the company’s flagship social networks, who do not want to be bombarded with personalized advertising can avoid it by paying a monthly fee. Meta can now file an objection and the Commission will decide within 12 months the outcome of its investigation, which could lead to a fine of 10% of its annual turnover (which would amount to around 13 billion euros).
The European Data Protection Board ruled late last year that Meta could no longer process its users’ personal data to serve them targeted advertising.
In recent years, the EU has created a world-first regulatory architecture to protect its citizens from the growing power of big tech. The first step was the entry into force in 2018 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a law that requires users to be informed of what data is being collected from them and for what purposes.
The next leg, made up of two pieces of legislation (the Digital Services Act, DSA, and the Digital Markets Act, DMA), establishes transparency and accountability mechanisms specifically aimed at large technology companies, including Meta. The third component of this defence shield is the Artificial Intelligence Regulation, approved at the beginning of the year and which will come into force on 1 August.
Today’s challenge is not the first time Meta has challenged European legislators. In February 2022, the technology company hinted that it would leave Europe (i.e. that European citizens would not be able to use Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp) if the legislation was not favourable to it. At that time, one of the major disputes between the European companies was about to be decided. Big Tech and the EU: whether or not the former can host the data of European citizens on US territory, which would mean that they would not be subject to restrictive European regulations. Finally, the US and the EU reached an agreement the following year. And Meta did not leave.
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