Meta Faces EU Inquiry Over CrowdTangle Closure
Meta’s decision to shut down CrowdTangle, an analytics tool regarded as invaluable by the research community, has drawn fresh scrutiny from European Union regulators. The EU Commission, which had previously expressed concerns about the social network’s plan to discontinue the tool ahead of global elections in 2024, is now pressing Meta for more details about its collaboration with researchers. The Commission had earlier cited the impending shutdown of CrowdTangle as part of a broader investigation into the company’s handling of disinformation campaigns and election-related policies.
Despite pleas from researchers and civil society organizations to keep CrowdTangle online through the end of the year, Meta proceeded with the shutdown. Regulators are now pointedly reminding Meta of its obligation under the Digital Services Act (DSA) to allow outside researchers access to its data. The EU Commission has requested Meta to provide more information on the measures it has taken to comply with its obligations to give researchers access to data that is publicly accessible on Facebook and Instagram, as required by the DSA, and on its plans to update its election and civic discourse monitoring functionalities.
The Commission is specifically requesting information about Meta’s content library and application programming interface (API), including their eligibility criteria, the application process, the data that can be accessed, and functionalities. Meta has previously pointed to the Meta Content Library as a replacement for CrowdTangle. However, access to the Meta Content Library is much more tightly controlled, and researchers have indicated it does not replicate all of CrowdTangle’s functionality.
In response to the EU Commission’s concerns, a Meta spokesperson stated that the company had announced earlier this year that CrowdTangle would be discontinued because it did not provide a complete picture of platform activities. Meta claims to have built new, more comprehensive tools for researchers, called the Meta Content Library & API, and remains in discussion with the European Commission on this matter.
Source: EU regulators question Meta about the shutdown of CrowdTangle
