Twitter rival Threads hasn't appeared in EU app stores ahead of launch

By Jillian Deutsch and Stephanie Bodoni
 

Meta Platforms Inc.’s Threads app — the social network launching this week to take on Twitter Inc. — isn’t yet appearing in some European app stores after users in the US and UK were offered a preorder option. 
 

App stores in some European Union countries, including Germany and Belgium, weren’t displaying Threads as of late Tuesday. The new service is expected to go live on Thursday, according to a listing on Apple Inc.’s App Store.

Ireland’s Data Protection Commission said that the service won’t be rolled out in the EU for the time being, according to a report in the country’s Independent newspaper on Tuesday that cited a spokesperson. The EU’s privacy regulator hasn’t actively blocked the app, but Meta hasn’t prepared for launching it in the bloc, the newspaper said, without citing a source. 

A spokesperson for Meta said that while it was preparing to roll out Threads in more than 100 countries, with more coming soon, the company isn’t providing the entire list. A representative for the DPC didn’t immediately respond to Bloomberg’s requests for comment. 

Meta has repeatedly clashed with European regulators over its treatment of user data. In May, the company was hit by a record €1.2 billion ($1.3 billion) privacy fine and given a deadline to stop shipping users’ data to the US after privacy regulators said it failed to adequately protect personal information. The company has said it would appeal the Irish decision, describing it as “flawed” and “unjustified.”

The Threads app, which is being launched through Meta’s Instagram business, will mimic Twitter’s text-based posts that can be shared and commented on. The social media giant is leveraging its billions of users to quickly gain scale and will let people on Threads follow the same accounts they’ve connected with on Instagram and keep their user name.