FILE PHOTO: Silhouettes of laptop users are seen next to a screen projection of Facebook logo in this picture illustration taken March 28, 2018. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration

BERLIN (Reuters) - The head of Germany's antitrust watchdog said on Monday he was "very optimistic" that his office would take action against Facebook FB.O this year after finding it had abused its market dominance to gather data on people without their consent.

“We are currently evaluating Facebook’s opinion on our preliminary assessment and I’m very optimistic that we are going to take further steps, even this year, whatever this would mean,” Federal Cartel Office President Andreas Mundt told a conference on competition law in Berlin.