Brussels has ordered Meta to reopen WhatsApp to rival AI agents before the market gets stitched up.
According to the Financial Times, the European Commission has told Meta to restore WhatsApp access for rival tech groups building AI assistants.
Officials said emergency action was needed to stop competition from being damaged before a full antitrust probe is finished. The move is one of Brussels’ first big competition interventions in the fast-moving market for autonomous agents powered by AI models.
The WhatsApp case sits under traditional antitrust law which moves at glacial pace in comparison to the newer Digital Markets Act.
EU competition chief Teresa Ribera said on 9 June 2026: “In rapidly evolving markets, competition can be lost long before a final decision is adopted.”
Ribera said the decision preserved “choice for citizens across Europe on the AI assistants they want to use with WhatsApp, without that decision being made for them”.
She added: “We cannot let large digital incumbents use their dominance of the past.”
AI start-up Interaction, which develops the AI assistant Poke.com, said it was “very happy” with the Commission’s decision. The move follows an antitrust investigation into WhatsApp launched in December 2025. Brussels was worried that Meta was using control of the chat app to favour its own AI services.
The interim measures landed days after Meta rolled out its new business agent. That lets WhatsApp enterprise users deploy AI agents to answer customers.
Brussels is being pushed to finish other investigations into US Big Tech outfits. One high-profile case targets Google over favouring its services in search results and steering rules in the Google Play app store.
Those cases are expected to include fines for breaking Brussels’ rules. They are politically twitchy because President Donald Trump has attacked EU regulatory action against US companies.
Meta said it would appeal the decision.
“The European Commission has decided that OpenAI and some of the largest companies in the world can use the paid-for WhatsApp Business product for free. This is regulatory over-reach subsidised by the many European companies that pay,” a Meta spokesperson said.
