The European Commission on Wednesday designated Google, Microsoft and Apple and three other technologies as content intermediaries, giving them six months to comply with the new obligations in the European Union (EU), and has launched an investigation to the last two.
The information was released on the day the new Digital Markets Act publishes the first list of content intermediaries (‘gatekeepers’) in the EU, which are large technology companies that work by connecting businesses and users.
The ‘gatekeepers’ list includes Alphabet (a Google group), Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta and Microsoft, designating a total of 22 essential platform services provided by these access controllers who will now have six months to go ‘to ensure full access’. compliance with the obligations” of the Digital Markets Act, the institution informs the press.
Among the 22 platforms discussed are TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp, Messenger, YouTube and Google services.
At the same time, the community board indicates that “it has launched four market studies to further evaluate the allegations made by Microsoft and Apple, according to which, despite reaching the thresholds, some of their basic platform services should not be considered ‘gateways'” , namely Bing, Edge and Microsoft Advertising (Microsoft) and iMessage (Apple).
“Under the terms of the Digital Markets Act, these investigations aim to determine whether a sufficiently substantiated response from the companies demonstrates that the services in question should not be designated,” the institution adds, pointing out that this investigation must be completed within a maximum period of time. period of five months.
In addition, the European Commission has launched a market investigation to determine whether Apple’s iPadOS should be designated as a ‘gatekeeper’, “despite the thresholds not being reached”. In another study to be conducted in 12 months, he points out without specifying further details. .
Brussels adds that, while Gmail, Outlook and Samsung Internet Browser meet the thresholds set out in the Digital Markets Act to be considered ‘gatekeepers’, they have provided “sufficiently reasoned arguments that show that these services are not are considered ‘gateways’ for the respective base platform. services”, so they did not have this designation.
“Following their designation, access controllers now have six months to comply with the full list of obligations provided for by law, giving end-users and business users of access control services more choice and freedom,” the institution concludes.
This designation is intended for content intermediaries, digital platforms that have an annual turnover of at least EUR 7.5 billion or a market value of at least EUR 75 billion in the EU in the last three financial years, are active in at least three Member States and have more than 45 million monthly active end users and over 10,000 annual active business users in the past three years.
The Digital Markets Act has been in effect since November last year and sets rules on what technology companies with ‘gatekeeper’ status can or cannot do in the EU, a kind of blacklist of rules for these major platforms.
The new Digital Markets Act will therefore apply to ‘gatekeepers’, companies that sometimes erect barriers between businesses and consumers and control entire ecosystems consisting of different platform services, such as online markets, operating systems, cloud services or online search engines.
It is foreseen that if a content intermediary (‘gatekeeper’) breaches the rules of the regulation, he may be fined up to 10% of his total worldwide turnover, a percentage that can rise to 20% in case of repetition.
Source: DN
