In a filing Monday to the US District Court for the District of Columbia, Facebook said the FTC “alleged no plausible factual basis for branding Facebook an unlawful monopolist,” labeling the agency’s claims as “litigation-driven fiction” that does not account for the competition from “surging rivals like TikTok.”
The FTC declined to comment.
In the revised complaint, which is about 50% longer than the original, the FTC covered many of the same arguments. The FTC continues to argue that Facebook broke the law by engaging in anticompetitive acquisitions, most notably of Instagram and WhatsApp, and denied third-party apps access to Facebook’s platform in anticompetitive ways. The updated complaint attempted to address the judge’s comment that FTC did not provide metrics to support its arguments by referencing how much time users spend on Facebook’s platform compared to other rivals, as well as the sheer number of daily and monthly users of Facebook services.
In its motion, Facebook alleged that even after being given more time to supply facts to substantiate its case against the company, the FTC has “not come close to doing so.”
