Everyone thinks it’s normal to call without knowing which provider the other uses, says MEP Paul Tang. “This should be a common exchange. It’s not just because Threema or Signal don’t want it, it’s also for the convenience of the user.”
Some MEPs, including Tang, expressed disappointment at a compromise that waters down the idea of interoperability, rather than extending it to more services. “Social media interoperability is being pushed into the distant future,” German MEP Martin Schirdewan, co-chair of the Left Group in the European Parliament, told WIRED via email. He also described it as a “scandal” that users have to wait three years before group chats can include members of different apps.
The Digital Markets Act is half of the twin technology legislation that MEPs promise to reshape Europe’s relationship with US tech giants. While its counterpart, the Digital Services Act, focuses on illegal content, the DMA is Europe’s response to complaints that have been circulating across the continent for years. Swedish Spotify says Apple’s app store fees give Apple Music an “unfair advantage”. Swiss email provider ProtonMail says Google and Apple use defaults to prefer their own email apps on Androids and iPhones. And German cloud provider NextCloud has labeled the way Microsoft bundles its OneDrive cloud storage service with the company’s other products as anticompetitive.
Still, European tech companies were hesitant to celebrate the new rules. The EU could have gone further, says ProtonMail founder Andy Yen, who has argued for “choice screens”, or a list of email providers that users can choose from when setting up a new device. “Based on what has been made public so far, it appears that choice screens will only be implemented for a very limited number of services, but we will have to wait for the final text to know for sure,” he says.
“We think [the DMA] is not strong enough to stop the anti-competitive behavior of the tech giants,” said Frank Karlitschek, CEO and founder of Nextcloud. “In addition, the effects of the DMA will depend on implementation, and it will take time to show the real results.” Rich Stables, CEO of the French price comparison service Kelkoo Group, would only describe the DMA as “potentially transformative”.
Tang says companies should not judge the DMA based on the laws that preceded it. The legislation will be enforced by the Commission, unlike the GDPR, which was enforced by Member States. “That’s a big change,” Tang says. He adds that even if companies don’t see specific answers to their problems in the legislation, the DMA contains tools to address a wide variety of issues. “We also have Article 10, which allows the Commission to put forward new obligations for the gatekeepers,” he says.
However, the skeptical mood was shared by the tech giants, who fought the legislation. Lobbyists working on behalf of Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft have held 48 meetings with officials in the European Parliament and the European Commission since December 2019, Brussels-based Transparency International EU told WIRED, though the group said this was just a partial photo, as not all MEPs publish lobbying meetings.
