Under French law, the clauses in the contracts between professionals and non-professionals or consumers, which have the purpose or effect of creating a significant imbalance between the rights and obligations of the parties to the contract, at the expense of the non-professional or the consumer, are abusive (article L.132-1 of the Consumer Code).

In particular, the clauses intended to eliminate or interfere with the exercise of proceedings by the consumer are presumed to be abusive.

Facebook had deleted a user account, as a result of failure to comply with the terms and conditions of use (the user had posted a photo of the painting 'The origin of the world' by Gustave Courbet).

Following the referral, by the user, to the Court of first instance of Paris for the reactivation of his account, Facebook claimed that the French court was not competent, stipulating the clause attributing jurisdiction to the California courts as laid out in the General Conditions of the Facebook contract.

The court of appeal of Paris declared this clause abusive, pointing out in particular that the clause in question required the subscriber, in case of conflict with Facebook, to present his case before a geographically distant Court and incur costs out of proportion with what is at stake economically for the contract signed for personal or family needs, while Facebook has an agency in France and has the financial and human resources to ensure its representation. The clause thus declared null and void.