On 26 February 2026, Advocate General Athanasios Rantos delivered his Opinion in appeals C-496/23 P and C-497/23 P, recommending that the Court of Justice of the European Union dismiss the appeals brought by Meta Platforms Ireland Ltd against the European Commission. The appeals challenged earlier rulings of the General Court of the European Union, which upheld Commission decisions requiring Meta to provide internal documents as part of an investigation into suspected abuse of a dominant position relating to Facebook user data and the Facebook Marketplace service.
The case originates from Commission decisions adopted in May 2020 under Council Regulation (EC) No 1/2003, which empowers the Commission to request information necessary to enforce EU competition law. The Commission requested extensive internal communications and documents identified using combinations of electronic search terms, covering several years and involving senior company personnel. These requests formed part of broader investigations into whether Meta’s handling of Facebook data and integration of Marketplace conferred an unfair competitive advantage.
Meta challenged the requests before the General Court, arguing that they were excessively broad, insufficiently reasoned, disproportionate, and incompatible with fundamental rights, including the right to privacy. In its judgments of 24 May 2023, the General Court rejected those arguments and confirmed that the Commission’s decisions were lawful, necessary, and proportionate. The court also found that appropriate procedural safeguards, including a virtual data room mechanism for handling sensitive personal data, had been implemented.
In his Opinion, Advocate General Rantos concluded that the General Court did not err in law in upholding the Commission’s decisions. He emphasized that Regulation No 1/2003 grants the Commission broad investigative powers to obtain information required for competition enforcement. He clarified that the Commission is not required, at the investigative stage, to demonstrate the precise relevance of each individual document requested. Instead, it must clearly define the subject matter of the investigation and the suspected infringement, which the Commission had done in this case.
The Advocate General further concluded that the Commission’s use of electronic search terms complied with the principle of necessity. He explained that the fact that search results may include irrelevant material does not undermine the legality of the request, provided the Commission could reasonably expect the search terms to identify relevant evidence. He also confirmed that necessity and proportionality cannot be assessed solely on the basis of the volume of documents requested, particularly in complex digital investigations where relevant evidence may be embedded within large datasets.
Addressing concerns relating to personal data, the Advocate General confirmed that the Commission may lawfully request documents containing both personal and professional information when such processing is necessary for the performance of its public interest tasks. He agreed with the General Court’s finding that adequate safeguards had been put in place and that the Commission’s actions did not result in disproportionate interference with privacy rights.
The Opinion is not binding on the Court of Justice, which will now deliberate and issue a final judgment at a later date. However, if the Court follows the Advocate General’s reasoning, the ruling would reinforce the Commission’s authority to obtain extensive internal data in competition investigations, particularly in cases involving digital platforms where data plays a central role in assessing potential abuses of dominance.