CONTENT
Digital Markets Act
CONTENT
Digital Markets Act
Origin
Regulation (EU) 2022/1925 on contestable and fair markets in the digital sector
General overview
The Digital Markets Act (the DMA), part of the EU’s digital strategy, aims to create a level playing field for all digital companies, big and small. In order to ensure fairness and contestability in digital markets, the DMA regulates potential anti-competitive activities of entities which are classified as “gatekeepers” in the digital sector.
To this end, the DMA prohibits certain practices and requires gatekeepers to comply with certain other positive obligations. Practices such as favouring or ranking the gatekeeper’s own products above those of others, bundling or pre-installation of certain apps and software and combining personal data collected across services will be prohibited.
Positive obligations placed on gatekeepers include requirements to ensure interoperability across messaging services, the provision of choices as to the browser and personal assistant available on new smartphones, and the provision of access to data generated through the use of their platforms.
The European Commission designated six gatekeepers under the DMA in September 2023: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta and Microsoft. The European Commission has further identified a total of 22 services provided by these gatekeepers as “core platform services”.
Status
Regulation applies across the EU since 2 May 2023
Implementing regulation applies since 2 May 2023
Consultation on compliance reporting for gatekeepers launched by Commission on 6 June 2023
REGULATION APPLIES
SINCE 2 MAY 2023