Explosive Court Documents: Facebook Gave Netflix Access To User DMs

According to the latest reports, it seems that Netflix allowed Facebook to check out user DMs for an impressive amount of money. Check out the latest reports about this below.

Netflix allowed to check out Facebook messages

According to recently unsealed court documents, the social media giant Meta allegedly allowed Netflix to access Facebook users’ direct messages for almost a decade, violating anti-competitive and privacy rules.

The documents are part of an anti-trust lawsuit filed by U.S. citizens Maximilian Klein and Sarah Grabert, who claim that Netflix and Facebook had a “special relationship” that allowed Netflix to create more targeted ads with the help of Facebook.

According to a lawsuit filed in April 2023, Facebook and Netflix had close ties that resulted in millions of dollars in ad revenue for Facebook.

The lawsuit claims that Netflix guaranteed ad spending of $150 million in 2017. Additionally, the lawsuit alleges that Reed Hastings, the co-founder of Netflix, joined Facebook’s board of directors and played a role in the closure of Facebook Watch, a streaming service that competed with Netflix.

The plaintiff is demanding that Hastings respond to the claims made in the lawsuit.

“For nearly a decade, Netflix and Facebook enjoyed a special relationship. Netflix bought hundreds of millions of dollars in Facebook ads; entered into a series of agreements sharing data with Facebook; received bespoke access to private Facebook APIs; and agreed to custom partnerships and integrations that helped supercharge Facebook’s ad targeting and ranking models,” the lawsuit states.

APIs are software components that enable computer programs to communicate and exchange information with each other.

The API agreement allowed “Netflix programmatic access to Facebook’s private messages inboxes, in exchange Netflix would ‘provide to FB a written report every two weeks that shows daily counts of recommendations sends and recipient clicks by interface, initiation surface, and/or implementation variation (e.g. Facebook vs. non-Facebook recommendation receipts).’”

Check out more mind-blowing data in Fox News’ original article.

Rada Mateescu
I'm hungry for truth, thirsty to learn, and eager to share. At Optic Flux, my goal is to deliver breaking juicy health, financial, and tech/science-related content. I focus on all that's meaningful and impactful for my readers.