Why Facebook is blocking news in Canada, and Google may be next

Meta is no longer displaying traditional media outlets on its sites in Canada as of Tuesday, after the country required the platforms to pay news outlets, and Google is set to follow.

Canada passed the Online News Act in June, requiring social media platforms to pay news outlets to use their content. Advocates for the legislation argued that platforms like Facebook and Instagram used news articles to garner their own ad revenue and that the media outlets making the content weren’t being adequately compensated.

Instead of paying the outlets, Meta chose to not place the articles in news feeds to begin with. While the law does not officially go into effect until January 2024, the tech giant is acting early.

“News outlets voluntarily share content on Facebook and Instagram to expand their audiences and help their bottom line,” Rachel Curran, Meta’s head of public policy in Canada, told Reuters. “In contrast, we know the people using our platforms don’t come to us for news.”

Google is also speaking out about the new law and says it will opt to to omit Canadian news sites from search results when it takes effect later this year. The company said its searches linked to Canadian news sites 3.6 billion times last year in total.