Facebook, Australia hold talks following news ban

Australia and Facebook conducted talks on Friday after the social media giant blacked out news for Australian netizens.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said he had spoken with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to resolve the issue at the earliest and negotiations would continue in the weekend. 

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  "We talked through their remaining issues and agreed our respective teams would work through them immediately," Frydenberg was quoted as saying by news agency AFP. 

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Prime Minister Scott Morrison called Facebook's behaviour threatening and asked it to "come back to the table". 

Morrison said the Australian government's decision to ask Facebook and Google to pay the media for news posted on their website has generated interest from across the world and he has also talked with Indian PM Narendra Modi and Canadian PM Justin Trudeau regarding the matter. 

Facebook has blanked out pages of news organisations from Thursday for Australian users and blocked them from publishing any news content over the new legislation that has been approved by the lower house. 

The social media giant has said the proposed legislation "fundamentally misunderstands" Facebook's relationship with news outlets and it has left with no choice other than blocking the news content. 

Since the ban by Facebook to block news content came into effect, the traffic of Australian news sites at home and abroad reduced substantially, with foreign traffic coming down by more than 20 per cent per day, according to data analytics company Chartbeat.