Meta is bowing to legal inevitability in the European Union: It’s just announced it will finally comply with regional privacy regulations by giving users a free choice to deny its behavioral advertising.

The tech giant is subject to an ongoing regulatory procedure over the legal basis it claims to run microtargeted ads which had been expected to conclude around the middle of this month. But in an update to a blog post today it announced its “intention” to switch to a consent-based legal basis for targeted advertising.

With the blog post, Meta looks to be trying to get out ahead of the regulatory outcome and potentially influence the implementation timeline as well as seeking to shape the narrative about what the looming switch means for its business, such as by claiming advertisers will still be able to run “personalized” ad campaigns on its platform.

Its blog post does not include a date for when it expects to make this change — with the company offering nothing more specific than a vague reference to “the months ahead” — but of course the exact compliance timeline is not in Meta’s gift; it will be up to EU regulators to decide.