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Facebook Sued in US Federal Court for Alleged Anticompetitive Conduct

European Firms Call for Tougher EU Approach to China

BRUSSELS—European companies called on European Union policy-makers on Jan. 16 to toughen their approach to China to secure a level playing field for European businesses. BusinessEurope, an organization grouping business federations from 35 countries, said China was the most restrictive of the EU’s major trading partners—with numerous barriers to investment, strict requirements for joint ventures and its procurement market closed to EU firms. “The EU must reconsider its modus operandi towards China and put more emphasis on reciprocity and conditionality,” BusinessEurope said in a report addressed to the European Commission and EU governments. It underlined the disparity in market access between Chinese and foreign firms, financing advantages for Chinese firms in strategic sectors, cheap land and energy, and Beijing’s support for some Chinese industries. The EU is China’s biggest trading…

Facebook Sued in US Federal Court for Alleged Anticompetitive Conduct

SAN FRANCISCO—Four companies sued Facebook Inc in U.S. federal court on Thursday for alleged anticompetitive conduct, saying the social network inappropriately revoked developer access to its platform in order to harm prospective competitors.

The plaintiffs sought class-action status and unspecified damages, according to a filing at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

“Facebook faced an existential threat from mobile apps, and while it could have responded by competing on the merits, it instead chose to use its might to intentionally eliminate its competition,” said Yavar Bathaee, a partner at law firm Pierce Bainbridge and co-lead counsel in the case.

The filing is an escalation of Facebook’s battles with small app developers that had built companies based on access to its user data. Facebook cut off access for specific apps as far back as 2012, while still allowing access for others.

Thousands of pages of damaging internal emails have emerged from a similar lawsuit filed by Six4Three, the developer of a now-shuttered bikini photo app. Facebook has described the Six4Three case as baseless.

Facebook did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the latest lawsuit.

The social network also faces multiple investigations into possible antitrust violations by regulators around the world.

By Katie Paul

This article is from the Internet:Facebook Sued in US Federal Court for Alleged Anticompetitive Conduct

Secretary of the Army: China Faces Newly Strengthened US in Indo-Pacific

WASHINGTON—As the United States works to counter the strategic threat posed by China in the region of the Indo-Pacific, the U.S. Army is taking on a more important role. Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy spoke at the Brookings Institute on Jan. 10 about how the Army is modernizing, expanding, and deepening its commitment and operational abilities in the Indo-Pacific theater of command. The Indo-Pacific, known in the Army as INDOPACOM, is home to the four most-populous countries in the world, as well as three of its largest economies, the United States, China, and Japan, McCarthy said. Critically, the region also holds six of the 10 largest armies in the world, he said. The United States has five treaties in the Indo-Pacific, “all critical for reinforcing the American narrative alternative…