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06 September 2019 "Even the largest social media platform must follow the law and respect consumers". This is how the New York attorney general, Letitita James, expressed herself in a press release issued today. Eight US states have launched an Antitrust investigation against Facebook. The general district of New York is leading the eight states - Florida, Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio and Tennessee - which will investigate on Facebook for possible violations of the anti-monopoly rules.

The survey will focus on "the industrial dominance of Facebook and its potentially anti-competitive conduct stemming from this dominance," Letitia said in a statement then relaunched by the Washington Post. The move marks the first official US antitrust intervention against one of the so-called Big Tech companies, although a similar case hit Microsoft in the 1990s. There will be two bipartisan groups of attorneys general to proceed with antitrust investigations: one for Facebook and one for Google.

The focus of the survey concerns the privacy and protection of user data. "We will use all the investigative tools at our disposal - Letitita said later - to determine if Facebook's actions could have endangered consumer data, reduced the quality of choices or increased the price of advertising". Facebook has announced that it will collaborate with the attorneys general of the American states that have started the antitrust investigation. The investigation should start in Washington on Monday and could also interest Amazon and other technology companies.

Shortly after the widespread note, Facebook opened sharply in the Wall Street exchange. The title of the social network fluctuates around -2%.