The German Federal Cartel Office does not want to give up in the fight against the market power of large internet companies. “There is a lot of scope for further proceedings,” said the head of the cartel office, Andreas Mundt, ahead of a ruling by the European Court of Justice on the collection of user data by Facebook’s parent company, Meta. The verdict is a milestone that will have far-reaching consequences for the business models of online giants.
Numerous proceedings are already underway at the German authority against Meta, Google and Co. The legislator had expanded the powers of the cartel watchdogs here. In early July, the German Bundestag gave the authority additional powers. Mundt refuted fears that more power for his authority would jeopardize Germany as a place of establishment.
At the beginning of July, the European Court of Justice supported the German cartel agency in the dispute with Facebook’s parent company Meta. The judges had ruled that authorities should include compliance with data protection regulations in antitrust proceedings. The specific case concerned a decision of the Federal Cartel Bureau from 2019. The competition authority prohibited Meta from aggregating personal information of users of its Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp services, citing data protection. The company abuses its market power by collecting data from users without their explicit consent. Meta took action against the cartel agency, the case ended up at the ECJ – then the decision came.
“The digital economy remains an important theme for the Bundeskartellamt,” said Mundt. The ECJ ruling is “a real milestone”. The agency is investigating the “data collection of BigTech”, which lies at the basis of the market power of the corporations. Proceedings against Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta and Microsoft are already pending at the Cartel Office or have already been partially completed.
Source: Krone
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
