WASHINGTON, Aug 19 - The Federal Trade Commission is expected to file its amended complaint against Facebook on Thursday accusing it of breaking antitrust laws.
The agency had filed a lawsuit in December accusing Facebook of breaking antitrust law to snap up smaller competitors such as Instagram and WhatsApp by blaming existing rivals over Facebook.
The agency had asked the Court to order Facebook to sell Instagram, which it bought for $1 billion in 2012 and WhatsApp, which it sold for $19 billion in 2014.
Judge James Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said in June that FTC's original complaint failed to show that Facebook had monopoly power in social-networking markets.
The judge also criticized portions of the FTC's case about Facebook's refusal to allow interoperability permission with competing apps, saying that the implementation of the policy could be illegal but that the FTC's examples were from 2013 and therefore too old for the court to consider them, among other criticisms.
He said that the FTC could file a new complaint by July 29 but the deadline was extended to August 19: The FTC could file a new complaint on June 30, 2007.
Boasberg had also dismissed a suit filed by multiple U.S. states, saying they waited too long to challenge the acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. The states have indicated that they will appeal.
The federal government and states filed a total of five lawsuits against Facebook and Google over Bipartisan outrage over their social media presence in the economy and the political sphere last year.