Bonn, Germany: The antitrust watchdog of Germany is about to take initial steps this year to start the probe against Facebook after the findings that indicated that the social media giant went against the rules of itself and the country to gather data related to people’s privacy without their knowledge or consent in this regard.

In Europe, the probe is being closely watched along with concerns over the alleged leaks of private data belonging to millions of Facebook users. The probe also involves the extensive use of ads targeted by foreign powers in order to influence United State’s general elections.

The Federal Cartel Office finds issues with the way Facebook takes private data of people using third party related apps which also includes its own WhatsApp and Instagram like services along with tracking people online who are not at all its members.

“We are conscious that this should, and must, go quickly,” cartel office President Andreas Mundt told a news conference on Monday while adding that he has got hope to take “first steps” this year. He declined to get into details.

In contrast to the European Union’s probes into Google that ended up in imposing multi-billion-dollar penalties, the probe by Germany does not seem to be ending up with huge fines for Facebook. The most recent case of Google is that it pre-installed its apps on Android smartphones.

Sources who have knowledge of the matter say that the cartel office could need the Facebook to take immediate measures to address all its concerns for which it does not take heed.

The request for information by cartel office’s request was responded by Facebook earlier and the authority said that it was reviewing about the new features like “clear history” option which was announced by CEO Mark Zuckerberg in May, would help address all its concerns in this regard.

“We need to establish whether this affects our investigation and addresses our concerns,” Mundt said.

In a separate way, Mundt confirmed all those comments he made and was seen in an interview with the newspaper this that he may soon launch an investigation with new powers into the e-commerce industry that enables the cartel office to launch probes into sectors.

The focus of those probes would be the “hybrid” platforms like that of U.S. e-commerce giant Amazon that sell of their own products and services but along with that, they do such for third party trader’s goods.

“Our question is: what is the relationship between the platform, which itself is a very powerful trader, and the traders who use the platform?” said Mundt. He added that Amazon is only an example which is best-known of the e-commerce platforms but his overall interest in the matter extended to other players.

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