The European Union has identified 22 “gatekeeper” services, operated by six major tech giants, as targets of its new Digital Markets Act (DMA), according to a September 7 report by Reuters. The regulation will apply to services provided by Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, and ByteDance, the owner of TikTok. DMA, seen as a companion to the Digital Services Act, is designed to create a level playing field between big tech companies and smaller competitors, and enhance service accessibility and compatibility in Europe, the report said. Under the DMA, companies with more than 45 million monthly active users and a market capitalization of 75 billion euros ($82 billion) are categorized as offering essential platform services. These designated businesses will be obligated to enable interoperability of their messaging apps with competitors and allow users to choose which apps to install on their devices. The tech giants have a six-month window to comply with the DMA’s provisions and their failure to do so could result in fines of up to 10% of their annual global turnover, according to the report. Reuters said companies involved have given mixed reactions to the new rules. TikTok said it “fundamentally disagreed with this decision” and was “disappointed that no market investigation was conducted prior to this decision,” adding it was considering its next steps. [Reuters]
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