Australia and Facebook held high-stakes talks Friday after the social media giant sparked global outrage by blacking out news for its Australian users, as Canberra insisted it wouldn’t back down on a new law that would force the tech firm to pay for journalistic content.
From Thursday, Facebook has blanked out the pages of media outlets for Australian users and blocked them from sharing any news content, rather than submit to the proposed legislation.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said he had spoken with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Friday to find a way out of the showdown, and that negotiations would continue over the weekend.
“We talked through their remaining issues and agreed our respective teams would work through them immediately,” Frydenberg said.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison also urged Facebook to “move quickly past” what he called threatening behavior and “come back to the table”.
He said his government’s world-first legislation to force Facebook and Google to pay Australian…