The Norwegian Media Businesses’ Association (MBL) says an Oslo court has paused Meta’s proposed business terms until a final ruling, as publisher objections and website-access concerns complicate the rollout.
According to MBL, 10 media companies brought the case. The group said the Oslo District Court issued a temporary order stopping Meta from applying the revisions until a final decision on whether they are lawful. MBL said the terms could reach any Norwegian business with a Facebook or Instagram page. It singled out publishers because they post editorial content on the services and rely on them. Board chair Lene Eltvik Vindfeld said, “We cannot accept that Meta dictates the terms governing the public’s access to content.”
Meta has also left the implementation date unsettled. On Oct. 28, Andy Stone, Meta’s vice president of communications, said on X that the company would consult industry groups before making policy changes. “We care deeply about our partners” and would not change policy without a full consultation, Stone wrote. He said the talks could extend past Nov. 20, with the existing terms remaining in force meanwhile.
Meta’s archived terms preview listed Oct. 30, 2026, as the effective date. Reuters reported Oct. 23 that the company had shifted the date to Nov. 20. EconoTimes previously covered the schedule change.
The proposed terms cover commercial uses of Meta products, including advertising, selling products and managing a Page. An earlier version of the preview allowed automated crawlers to visit websites associated with business accounts and included training as a possible use of collected content. Nieman Lab’s comparison found that a later version dropped the express training reference and listed advertising and business products as uses. Meta told Nieman Lab those edits did not broaden its existing rights and said site administrators could use robots.txt to register crawler instructions.
The News/Media Alliance warned that the language might enable Meta to gather material from publisher websites for AI applications. In the United Kingdom, a government minister told the House of Lords that the European Commission had received a formal competition complaint on Oct. 22 and would assess it. The minister also said the Competition and Markets Authority was engaging directly with Meta. Meta has not named the groups it will consult or announced another start date.
