The Wall Street Journal reported that Meta plans to move to a “Pay for your Rights” model, where EU users will have to pay $ 168 a year (€ 160 a year) if they don’t agree to give up their fundamental right to privacy on platforms such as Instagram and Facebook. History has shown that Meta’s regulator, the Irish DPC, is likely to agree to any way that Meta can bypass the GDPR. However, the company may also be able to use six words from a recent Court of Justice (CJEU) ruling to support its approach.
Of course, that just means you don’t see ads on Instagram/Facebook. They still collect your data, aggregate it and trade it with data brokers, so the ads you see elsewhere (not to mention prices you’re offered) will become more accurate. In fact, it’s not unlikely that the behavioural data of people who pay to opt out of being spammed with ads will be more valuable to data brokers.
Also, for those who don’t pay, the ads will get more frequent and annoying to induce them to pay. (See also: Spotify)