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CMA opens investigation into Google’s Privacy Sandbox browser changes
Continue reading: CMA opens investigation into Google’s Privacy Sandbox browser changesThe Competition and Markets Authority has just announced it will investigate Google’s decision to remove third-party cookies from its Chrome browser in early 2022 and replace them with a set of proposals known as the Privacy Sandbox (NB: Google has justified this decision on privacy). The investigation – under Chapter II of the Competition Act…
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Digital Platforms and the Law: Ten Predictions for 2021
Continue reading: Digital Platforms and the Law: Ten Predictions for 2021Happy New Year to the readers of this blog! 2020 was an eventful year for digital platforms – or, at least, the largest of them – with a combination of lawsuits, competition law investigations and regulatory proposals. When we set up our Platform Law Practice at Geradin Partners, we did not know we would be…
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Texas, other US States sue Google for anti-competitive conduct and collusion with Facebook
Continue reading: Texas, other US States sue Google for anti-competitive conduct and collusion with FacebookLast Wednesday, on 16 December 2020, Texas and nine other US States filed an antitrust lawsuit before the District Court for the Eastern District of Texas with respect to Google’s conduct in ad tech (reminder: almost two months earlier the Department of Justice sued Google with respect to its practices in general search; click here…
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The EU Digital Markets Act in 10 points
Continue reading: The EU Digital Markets Act in 10 pointsYesterday the European Commission unveiled its much-expected proposal for a Digital Markets Act. Our general impression is that it is a solid and sophisticated piece of work with a fairly wide scope of application (i.e., going beyond the GAFA), which would place significant constraints on digital gatekeepers. Here is our (very preliminary) analysis in 10…
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FTC, US States file antitrust lawsuit against Facebook to challenge its “buy-or-bury”, “open-first, closed-later” strategies
Continue reading: FTC, US States file antitrust lawsuit against Facebook to challenge its “buy-or-bury”, “open-first, closed-later” strategiesWednesday December 9th, 2020: the US Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) and 48 US States (led by New York State Attorney General Letitia James) filed antitrust lawsuits against Facebook, arguing the tech giant has unlawfully maintained its monopoly power in the market for “Personal Social Networking” in breach of Section 2 of the Sherman Act (see…
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There is much to like in the CMA Digital Markets Taskforce’s advice to the UK government on a pro-competition regime for digital markets
Continue reading: There is much to like in the CMA Digital Markets Taskforce’s advice to the UK government on a pro-competition regime for digital marketsYesterday, the Digital Markets Taskforce led by the CMA issued its advice (the “Advice”) regarding the setting of a pro-competition regime in digital markets in the UK, referred to as a Strategic Market Status (“SMS regime”). This Advice is a very rich document of 89 pages, accompanied by several Appendices. This post does not intend…
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Shall we see a scaled-down version of the New Competition Tool?
Continue reading: Shall we see a scaled-down version of the New Competition Tool?Yesterday, Commissioners Vestager and Breton confirmed via a funny tweet that the Commission’s proposal for a Digital Markets Act (DMA) and a Digital Services Act (DSA) will come out on 15 December, instead of 9 December as was originally scheduled. We will therefore have to be a bit more patient. The other DMA-related news was…
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The UK Government’s reponse to the CMA Market Study: Some good news with some remaining questions
Continue reading: The UK Government’s reponse to the CMA Market Study: Some good news with some remaining questionsIn July 2020, the CMA published the Final Report of its Online Platforms and Digital Advertising Market Study, which recommended the adoption of a new pro-competition regulatory regime to govern the behaviour of major platforms funded by digital advertising, like Google and Facebook. I was very pleased with this report as it, among others, shed…
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New paper on Chrome and the Privacy Sandbox
Continue reading: New paper on Chrome and the Privacy SandboxIn an earlier post discussing the fate of targeted advertising, I noted that much of the current debate centers around issues of competition and privacy, and the inevitable trade-offs between them. While personalized advertising promises benefits for publishers and advertisers (and in theory users that value relevant ads), it is under increasing pressure from privacy…
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Digital Markets Act: Why the CERRE Recommendations Paper gets it entirely right
Continue reading: Digital Markets Act: Why the CERRE Recommendations Paper gets it entirely rightA lot of things have been written about the Digital Markets Act, which will be proposed by the Commission on 9 December. In most cases, I agree with some of the recommendations made, while disagreeing with others. For the first time, however, I fully agree with a set of recommendations made by others, which is…