The Digital Markets Act (DMA) has brought about significant changes for the six tech giants under the European Union’s regulation, including Alphabet/Google, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance/TikTok, Meta, and Microsoft. As the compliance deadline passed yesterday, these companies are now under strict scrutiny by EU enforcers.
The bloc will closely monitor whether these tech giants are following DMA regulations, which require them to treat business users fairly on their regulated core platform services and meet other legal obligations regarding data portability, platform interoperability, and user choice. Failure to comply risks facing hefty fines of up to 10% or even 20% of their global annual turnover.
The first round of non-confidential compliance reports, which include links to individual reports, has been published on the Commission’s DMA website. The reports vary in detail, with Apple’s being the shortest at just 12 pages, focusing on changes made to their App Store, iOS, and Safari browser. On the other hand, Microsoft has opted for multiple reports, breaking down their disclosures into separate documents for their two designated core platform services, Windows and LinkedIn.
While Apple has used their public report to voice their concerns over enforced changes to their “integrated, end-to-end system,” Microsoft’s reports seem intentionally mundane, using legal language and redactions that suggest they are reproducing formal submissions to the Commission. The length of their report is also noteworthy.
Meanwhile, Amazon has produced the most visually appealing report, using graphics and photos to package their disclosures in a sleek brochure-like format. Google’s report, on the other hand, is over 200 pages long and filled with dense text and hyperlinked footnotes, with screenshots, diagrams, and box-outs. This is justified by the fact that eight of their products are designated as core platform services.
Social networking giants Meta and ByteDance have fewer regulated services, resulting in their reports being of moderate length. ByteDance’s report is written in raw, redacted legalese, while Meta has put their usual PR spin on theirs. They begin the report by boasting about the 11,000 employees and 590,000 engineering hours dedicated to complying with the DMA, and highlight the “meaningful choices” they claim to offer European users.
It’s a daunting task for Commission enforcers to wade through all these documents and gather additional information to assess whether these tech giants are adhering to DMA regulations. For easy reference, we have compiled links to the gatekeepers’ first batch of public-facing DMA compliance reports below.
If you’re looking for an overview of the DMA and its objectives, check out our earlier explainer.
Links to gatekeeper DMA compliance reports:
- Alphabet/Google (211 pages)
- Amazon (32 pages)
- Apple (12 pages)
- ByteDance/TikTok (52 pages)
- Meta (57 pages)
- Microsoft (Summary – 13 pages)
- Windows Report (164 pages)
- LinkedIn (244 pages)
In addition, Microsoft has published five more documents disclosing audits of their consumer profiling techniques used in core platform services (report 1, report 2, report 3, report 4, and report 5), two of which were written by the third party they hired for the audits (Deloitte), adding another 104 pages to their reporting. In total, Microsoft’s reporting for this round totals to 525 pages.
