Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified before the Federal Trade Commission this week as part of the regulator’s ongoing antitrust investigation into the company, as reported by Politico on Thursday.
A Facebook Company spokesperson said in a statement: “We are committed to cooperating with the US Federal Trade Commission’s inquiry and answering the questions the Agency may have.”
Now FTC has been investigating Facebook for potential violations of US antitrust law for at least a year. In July 2019, Facebook announced that the agency had launched a probe into the company as part of its quarterly earnings disclosures.
According to a report of Politico, that investigation is still ongoing, and Zuckerberg testified under oath over the course of two days this week as part of the probe.
Facebook is under several antitrust investigations outside of the FTC’s. Last September, a coalition of state attorneys general, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James, opened an investigation into the social media company.
Since last July, the House Judiciary Committee has been investigating big tech companies, including Facebook. Just last month, that House panel held a hearing where Zuckerberg testified, along with the CEOs of Apple, Amazon, and Google.
Throughout that hearing, Zuckerberg faced questions about Facebook’s acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) dug into Zuckerberg over text messages the committee obtained that suggested he threatened to copy Instagram as a new Facebook product if the photo-sharing app’s co-founder Kevin Systrom didn’t agree to sell it to the social media giant.
