The European Commission has appointed six gatekeepers under the Digital Markets Act. These are five American tech giants (Amazon, Alphabet, Apple, Meta, Microsoft) and the Chinese ByteDance.

The European Commission has appointed six gatekeepers under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). These are companies that, according to the EU, are responsible for so-called core platform services. Through these services, gatekeepers have a major impact on Europe’s digital world. To ensure fairness and transparency and prevent abuse of this dominant position, the six companies are given six months to comply with the (particularly strict) obligations of the DMA for all of their core platform services.

The Digital Markets Act has been in force since the beginning of May and lays out the rules of the game that technology companies must play by. For example, the law must ensure fair competition on the European playing field. The gatekeepers are the biggest players in this field. They manage platforms that are responsible for at least €7.5 billion in annual revenue and handle 45 million users per month.

gatekeeper

The European Commission therefore appointed six gatekeepers on Wednesday. These gatekeepers in turn jointly manage 22 central platform services. According to the DMA, such services are important entry points between businesses and consumers. For example, Microsoft and Alphabet are gatekeepers, Windows and Android are core platform services.

Today’s appointment follows a 45-day review process after tech players were able to declare themselves as potential gatekeepers. Samsung was also eligible with its internet browser but eventually dropped out, as did Gmail and Outlook.

The tech giants must therefore adhere to stricter rules to ensure and improve competition in the digital market. For example, messaging services like Messenger or WhatsApp need to ensure they are compatible with smaller services. Use of user data for targeted advertising is only permitted with the express consent of the person concerned. These rules apply, among other things, to search engines, social media, operating systems and Internet marketplaces.

market research

After statements by Microsoft and Apple, the European Commission immediately initiated four market investigations. They claim that some of their services (e.g. Bing, Edge, iMessage) are not core platform services, although the EU has classified them as such. The study is expected to be completed within five months. Another study is intended to clarify whether Apple’s iPadOS is a core platform service, although it fundamentally falls short of the requirements.

The six gatekeepers therefore have six months to fulfill the laundry list of conditions. Four commandments and four prohibitions serve as guidelines. Gatekeepers must:

• allow third parties to interoperate with the gatekeeper’s own services in certain situations;
• Give business users access to the data they generate themselves on the Gatekeeper platform;
• Providing the necessary tools and information for advertisers and publishers using their platform to analyze ads on the Gatekeeper platform themselves;
• Allow business users to promote their offers on the platform and contract with customers off-platform.

Conversely, gatekeepers are definitely not allowed to:

• evaluate own services and products on the platform or treat them more favorably than comparable products or services of third parties;
• Prohibition for consumers to contact companies outside the platform;
• prevent users from automatically uninstalling installed software or apps;
• Track end-users outside of the Gatekeeper’s core platform service for the purpose of targeted advertising without providing effective consent.

sanctions

Otherwise, the Commission can impose fines of up to ten percent of global sales. In the case of repeated violations, this can even be up to twenty percent. Incidentally, the list of gatekeepers is not exhaustive. There is a possibility that Europe will see even more companies as gatekeepers in the coming months or years.

The reactions to the news were not long in coming. The press agency Belga knows that Apple reacted “very concerned”. According to the American company, the new European regulations will lead to further problems in the area of ​​data protection. ByteDance (TikTok) also reacted negatively and even fundamentally rejects the decision to consider the video app as a gatekeeper. Nonetheless, “ByteDance supports DMA’s European goal of creating a more competitive environment.”