The European Union has concluded in a preliminary report that the “addictive” design features of Instagram and Facebook have placed Meta in breach of the bloc’s digital laws.

The Commission said Meta failed to properly assess and mitigate the risks posed by features such as infinite scrolling, autoplay, push notifications, and highly personalised recommendation systems, which it said could negatively affect the physical well-being of users, particularly minors and other vulnerable groups.

The findings, issued under the EU’s Digital Services Act, are preliminary.

If confirmed, Meta could face fines of up to six per cent of its total annual global turnover.

“We disagree with these preliminary findings, which don’t accurately take into account the significant steps we’ve taken to protect teens,” a spokesperson from Meta said.

Since the investigation began, Meta said it has introduced Teen Accounts, a feature designed to automatically protect young users while giving parents greater control.

The feature allows parents to restrict nighttime access and set a daily screen time limit of 15 minutes.