Digital Markets Act

Apple retreats in fight to defend App Store in Europe

13Mar

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Technology

Apple retreats in fight to defend App Store in Europe

[ad_1] Apple made a major concession in its battle to protect the dominance of its App Store on iPhones and other devices in Europe on Tuesday, saying developers will be free to distribute their apps directly to consumers.Apple announced the changes to comply with the European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), which kicked in last week. The changes could dent the high profit margins and steady stream of revenue that Apple has come to rely on from its App store, where it charges developers fees of up to 30%. The changes, which affect only the European Union, come amid continuing criticism from rivals that Apple's compliance efforts are falling short. Beginning this spring, software developers operating in Europe will be able to distribute apps to EU customers directly from their own web...

Billionaire Elon Musk’s X could face EU’s digital dominance crackdown

3Mar

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Technology

Billionaire Elon Musk’s X could face EU’s digital dominance crackdown

[ad_1] Elon Musk's social media platform X could face a raft of new European Union rules that place curbs on the behavior of some of the world's largest technology firms, after the company told regulators it may meet criteria to fall under the scope of the bloc's Digital Markets Act. The DMA, set to take effect on Thursday, lays out a series of dos and don'ts for the likes of Alphabet Inc.'s Google Search, Apple's Safari, Amazon.com Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc.'s Facebook among others. It could also be applied to Musk's X, as well as Booking Holdings Inc.'s accommodation platform and ByteDance Ltd., the European Commission said late Friday. The DMA is intended to head off competition violations by tech firms before they take root. It will be applied to firms with a significant impact ...

Apple iMessage, Microsoft Bing Dodge EU’s Big Tech Crackdown

14Feb

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Technology

Apple iMessage, Microsoft Bing Dodge EU’s Big Tech Crackdown

[ad_1] Apple Inc.'s iMessage and Microsoft Corp.'s Bing search engine, Edge web browser and Advertising service will avoid strict new European Union rules reining in Big Tech platforms.A probe concluded that the services don't hold a dominant enough position to be regulated under the EU's Digital Markets Act, the European Commission announced on Tuesday. Apple and Microsoft said they welcomed the decision in separate statements following the announcement. The decision from EU regulators is a win for the two US firms, which would have been obliged to adapt their services to meet a swathe of new obligations and prohibitions designed to limit market power abuses. The decision confirms an earlier Bloomberg News report that the services would escape the scope of the tech crackdown. We are...

EU hails ‘change’ as Apple App Store opens to competition

27Jan

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Technology

EU hails ‘change’ as Apple App Store opens to competition

[ad_1] The European Union's digital enforcer celebrated on Friday the "change" underway in the tech world after Apple yielded to a new EU law by announcing it would allow alternative app stores on the iPhone for the first time.The significant overhaul, which will take place in March when the European Union's sweeping Digital Markets Act comes into force, will curtail the dominance of the App Store, which has been a mainstay of the iPhone since 2008. "The DMA will open the gates of the internet to competition so that digital markets are fair and open," European internal market commissioner Thierry Breton said when asked by AFP about Apple's announcement. "Change is already happening." Breton said that from March 7, when the law comes into force, the European Commission will assess the pr...

Meta, TikTok challenge incoming EU digital market law

18Nov

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Technology

Meta, TikTok challenge incoming EU digital market law

[ad_1] Tech giants Meta and TikTok are contesting the scope of an EU law that from March will set new rules on competition in the digital marketplace.The European Commission has designated 22 big online companies as "core platform services" to be subject to additional scrutiny and obligations under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) aiming to crack down on anti-competitive practices. The list includes familiar brands ranging from social networks Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, to so-called "intermediation" apps such as Google Maps, Amazon Marketplace and Apple's AppStore, to operating systems iOS, Android and Windows and Google Search. Six tech titans behind the platforms -- US groups Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta and Microsoft, and Chinese group ByteDance -- have been labelled "gatekeepers"...

Microsoft Facing Formal EU Complaint Over Teams Video App

19Sep

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Technology

Microsoft Facing Formal EU Complaint Over Teams Video App

[ad_1] Microsoft Corp.'s attempt at avoiding deeper European Union scrutiny of its Teams video-conferencing app fell flat with the bloc's antitrust enforcers readying a formal complaint against the firm's conduct.Microsoft's recent proposal to split its Teams from a broader business software package and sell it to customers separately with an annual discount wasn't enough to satisfy regulators' concerns, according to people familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The European Commission is preparing a statement of objections to send to the company, which could come in the next few months, the people said. At the end of August, Microsoft attempted to allay concerns raised by the EU's antitrust arm as part of a new investigation into how it ties Teams to its Office ...