What released on Monday five investigations against Apple, Alphabet and Meta, which are suspected of violating competition rules under the new DMA Digital Markets Act. The investigation is about possible restrictions and limitations that tech giants are putting in place to have an edge over competitors.

The commission will investigate whether Apple and Google favored their own app stores, and Facebook will try to determine whether users’ personal data was used for advertising purposes.

This is the first investigation launched under the new digital markets law that recently came into force and aims to further reduce the dominance of the biggest digital platforms on the internet, the idea is also to offer more options to users. to choose

The DMA, or Digital Markets Regulation, aims to ensure that the very large online platforms that act as the “gatekeepers” of digital markets operate properly on the Internet.

Margrethe Vestager, the European Commission’s executive vice-president for digital policy, says these are strong and symbolic examples of what DMA regulation should offer at the level of choice customers will have.

In Apple and Google, the EC investigator wants to know whether these companies have changed the rules of their app stores to allow developers to also advertise their offers outside of Google Play or the App Store, especially since in many cases consumers can get lower prices outside of those two program stores.

CE wants to know whether Apple and Google impose different restrictions on developers that would prevent these smaller companies from telling users details related to offers, contracts or possible additional fees.

Apple will also analyze aspects related to how users can remove certain apps from iOS or change certain default settings quickly and easily.

Meta (Facebook, Instagram) will analyze the so-called “pay or consent” model, which means that the network must have the user’s consent to be able to combine personal data from different services and then use it for advertising purposes. Meta has offered EU users a paid subscription, so those who pay will not be targeted with ads.

EU officials say this pay-or-consent model is not a viable option for those who don’t want to pay a monthly subscription to Facebook, as it does NOT achieve the goal of preventing the massive accumulation of data by these tech giants.

The Commission hopes to be able to complete the procedures that are currently open within 12 months.

The maximum fine that can be imposed is 10% of the world turnover.

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