EU opens probe into Apple, Google and Meta aiming to reign in Big Tech: What’s happening
EU antitrust regulators opened their first investigations under the Digital Markets Act into Apple, Alphabet’s Google and Meta Platforms claiming potential breaches of landmark EU tech rules. The EU executive said in a statement as per news agency Reuters, “The (European) Commission suspects that the measures put in place by these gatekeepers fall short of effective compliance of their obligations under the DMA.”
The EU antitrust will investigate Alphabet’s rules on Google Play and self-preferencing on Google Search. Meanwhile, Apple is being probed over rules on their App Store and the choice screen for Safari and Meta’s ‘pay or consent model’ is being checked.
The commission said that it “suspects that the measures put in place by these gatekeepers fall short of effective compliance of their obligations under the DMA”, adding, “The Commission is concerned that the binary choice imposed by Meta’s ‘pay or consent’ model may not provide a real alternative in case users do not consent, thereby not achieving the objective of preventing the accumulation of personal data by gatekeepers.”
The commission also said that is concerned that Google and Apple are imposing “various restrictions and limitations” including charging fees that prevent apps from freely promoting offers.
The European Commission said it was investigating the companies for “non-compliance” with the Digital Markets Act- a broad rulebook that targets Big Tech “gatekeeper” companies providing “core platform services”. The rules force the companies to comply with a set of do’s and don’ts and in case they don’t they need to pay heavy financial penalties or even end businesses in the EU. The aim of the rules is to make digital markets “fairer” and “more contestable” by breaking up closed tech ecosystems.
