Facebook is facing perhaps its greatest existential threat yet as the company prepares to battle two antitrust lawsuits brought by the US government and more than 40 states. But while analysts are calling the crackdown an important step, whether the social media giant can be reined in remains to be seen.

The lawsuits brought against Facebook on Wednesday accuse the company of wielding its “monopoly power” to crush and overwhelm its rivals. The cases tackle Facebook’s acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp in particular, deals which federal regulators now say should be unwound.

The move by the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and 48 attorneys general is being heralded by some analysts as an unprecedented move, and one that’s long overdue. But there’s still a long way to go, especially as the lawsuits could take years to litigate.

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“It never should have gotten to this point,” says Matt Stoller, the director of research at the American Economic Liberties Project, who sides with Lemley in seeing the suit as a big step forward. “After 20 years of lawlessness, people are trying to enforce the law.”

Facebook has faced scrutiny over its user data practices for years, and Stoller and others hope the lawsuits will shed light on this and other issues linked to the company’s market dominance.

“It’s pretty obvious that they should be unwound,” he adds. “The moment they got market power they stopped protecting your data because they wanted more information and you didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

“Very glad to see states connect FB’s monopolization to all around quality degradation, including increase in ad load, proliferation of fake accounts, and inaccurate performance & other metrics for advertisers,” tweeted Lina Khan, an associate professor of law at Columbia Law School, on Wednesday, adding she hoped the suits will mark “yet another step forward in the growing efforts to rehabilitate antitrust laws & recover antimonopoly”.