The EU Gave Meta an Ultimatum: Turn Off the Addictive Features or Pay - and Here No One Asks

The European Commission has given Meta an ultimatum: either redesign the features that make Facebook and Instagram addictive, or pay a fine. For the first time a regulator officially names what every user feels every day - infinite scrolling isn't accidental, it's designed.

According to the Commission, Meta breaches the European Digital Services Act (DSA) through features like infinite scrolling, autoplaying video, push notifications and highly personalised recommendation algorithms. These, it says, feed the user's urge to keep scrolling and switch the brain into "autopilot mode" - a state that leads to unhealthy habits and compulsive use.

The heaviest accusation concerns children. The Commission claims Meta ignored evidence of how much time minors spend on Instagram and Facebook late at night, and how features like Reels and Stories encourage excessive use. The time-management tools, even those switched on by default for teenagers, are easily dismissed and bring no real reduction in usage, the regulator concludes.

This isn't an abstract fight in Brussels. Children in Skopje, Tetovo and Bitola open those same features every evening, on those same apps. The difference is that the EU has a law and fines with which it can apply pressure, while our region watches from the sidelines as someone else defends its users. Does anyone here even pose the same dilemma - or do we wait for Brussels to solve it for us?

Meta must now disable the key addictive features or face a fine that under the DSA can reach a percentage of global revenue. The company has several times called such decisions exaggerated. But this time the question isn't whether the features are addictive - the regulator already asserts that - but how long Meta can play for delay before the fine becomes more expensive than the change itself.