Will Instagram and WhatsApp Stay with Meta? FTC Antitrust Trial Kicks Off Monday

Antitrust Trial Kicks Off: The US Federal Trade Commission's trial against Meta begins in Washington, DC on Monday, as the tech giant fights to avoid the spinoff of Instagram and WhatsApp. The FTC alleges that Meta illegally acquired the two startups to suppress competition.

Meta (then Facebook) bought the photo-sharing startup Instagram for $1 billion in 2012. About two years later, the company snatched up the chat tool WhatsApp for roughly $22 billion.

Lawyers for the FTC and Meta will deliver opening statements on Monday before U.S. District Judge James Boasberg in a trial expected to stretch for seven to eight weeks.

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The case will involve extensive evidence and testimony from multiple witnesses. The government is expected to call Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, former COO Sheryl Sandberg, and Instagram head Adam Mosseri to the stand, reported NPR.

According to a report by The Wall Street Journal, Zuckerberg personally lobbied Trump to urge the FTC to drop the case, a claim Meta has denied.

Zuckerberg and Trump shared a strained relationship, partly due to Trump’s removal from Meta’s platforms after the January 2021 Capitol riot.

In a statement issued late last week, Meta spokesperson Christopher Sgro said the FTC’s lawsuit “defies reality” and reiterated that the company operates in a highly competitive social media market.

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“The evidence at trial will show what every 17-year-old in the world knows: Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp compete with Chinese-owned TikTok, YouTube, X, iMessage and many others,” Sgro said.

“More than 10 years after the FTC reviewed and cleared our acquisitions, the Commission’s action in this case sends the message that no deal is ever truly final,” he added.

What would it mean for users of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp if Meta was forced to break up?

The FTC says it would mean more robust competition among social media startups, and therefore better quality services for everyone. Government lawyers argue that Meta's services have degraded in quality in part because of its dominant position in the marketplace.

Regulators also say Meta's privacy protections have lapsed as a result of its alleged monopoly status. To the FTC, a break-up would translate into a more vibrant social media landscape, where new upstarts can go toe to toe with Meta's apps. But Meta contends the opposite: That a breakup would make each of its individual apps less integrated and worse for consumers after many years in which Meta's systems and data have become entwined.

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