The new European Digital Markets Act (DMA), which sets a number of obligations and prohibitions for digital companies offering platform services, came into force on Tuesday.
Coming on the heels of the Digital Services Act (DSA), which took effect last week, the DMA should strengthen the rights of users of services such as Google and Meta, and reduce abuse.
The DMA aims to put an end to the unfair practices of certain tech giants. Until now, the European Commission, as supervisor, had to rely mainly on classical competition law, but this approach has shown its limits.
Do's and don'ts for 'gatekeepers'
Large technology companies, which occupy key market positions due to their size, are considered “gatekeepers.” They will now have to comply with a series of industry-specific “do’s and don’ts.”
For example, the largest messaging services, such as Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger and iMessage, will have to ensure that they are interoperable with smaller services, if the latter so wish.
Personal data can only be used for targeted advertising if the data subject has given explicit consent.
Gatekeepers will no longer be allowed to rank their own products or services higher than those of their competitors.
Requiring the use of certain services as a condition for inclusion in the App Store will no longer be allowed.
Compliance deadline 6 March 2024
Companies covered by the DMA must have at least 45 million residential end users per month and more than 10,000 annual business users.
With this legislation, potential gatekeepers will have until 3 July to register their core platform services with the European Commission.
The Commission will then have 45 working days to judge whether the companies concerned actually meet the thresholds and can be considered gatekeepers.
Such companies must then ensure that they meet all the requirements of the DMA by 6 March 2024.
