The EU Commission on Wednesday designated 22 services of six major tech companies as “gatekeepers” of online services providing messaging to video sharing in its latest crackdown on Big Tech.
Under the EU’s Digital Markets Act, companies with more than 45 million monthly active users and a market capitalization of 75 billion euros ($82 billion) providing a core platform service will meet the new standard.
Gatekeepers will be required to make their messaging apps interoperate with competitors, allowing users to decide which apps to pre-install on their devices.
“We remain very concerned about the privacy and data security risks the DMA poses for our users,” an Apple spokesperson said in a statement sent to FOX Business. “Our focus will be on how we mitigate these impacts and continue to deliver the very best products and services to our European customers.”
An Amazon spokesperson said the company notes that “the designations that the European Commission has made and are committed to delivering services that meet our customers’ requirements within Europe’s evolving regulatory landscape.”
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Alphabet’s Google has the highest number of services, including Android operating system, Maps and Search, which would face tougher rules. Meta’s Facebook, Instagram, Marketplace and WhatsApp also qualified as gatekeepers.
According to the EU, the companies will have six months to comply and can be fined up to 10% of their annual global turnover for DMA violations.
“We are evaluating the Commission’s designations and will set out further information in due course as we work to comply with the DMA,” a Meta company spokesperson said.
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Gatekeeper companies can request an interim measure to suspend the application of the rules, but they would need to launch a legal case in the EU Court of Justice in Luxembourg to do that, a senior Commission official said. “We haven’t seen anything like that so far.”
The EU commission said Alphabet’s Gmail, Microsoft’s Outlook and Samsung’s browser were exempted after the companies showed these services do not qualify as gatekeepers.
The Commission has also opened four market investigations into Microsoft and Apple, saying some of their core platforms like Bing, Edge, Microsoft Advertising and Apple’s iMessage services do not qualify as gateways.
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“We accept our designation as a gatekeeper under the Digital Markets Act and will continue to work with the European Commission to meet the obligations imposed on Windows and LinkedIn under the DMA,” a Microsoft spokesperson said in a statement. “We welcome the Commission’s decision to open a market investigation to consider our application to exempt Bing, Edge, and Microsoft Ads — which operate as challengers in the market — from the DMA.”
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A spokesperson for TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, said: “We support the DMA’s goal of creating a competitive playing field in Europe but fundamentally disagree with this decision.”
“TikTok has brought choice to a space largely controlled by incumbents and this decision risks undermining the DMA’s stated goal by protecting actual gatekeepers from newer competitors like TikTok,” the spokesperson continued. “We’re extremely disappointed that no market investigation was conducted prior to this decision and are evaluating our next steps.”
Alphabet did not respond to FOX Business’ request for comment.
Reuters contributed to this report.
