The EU Commission has officially confirmed which tech companies and which of their services are considered ‘gatekeepers’ under the new stringent Digital Markets Act (DMA). The companies listed all appeared on a preliminary list released in early July and are predominantly composed of American tech giants. These include Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft from the USA, as well as ByteDance from China. Several of these companies’ services must now comply with the DMA by March 2024 at the latest.
DMA is the EU’s attempt to limit the power of large tech companies by opening up established platforms and reducing ecosystem lock-ins and anti-competitive behavior. For example, major messaging apps will be required to work with their competitors, while operating systems must be designed to offer third-party app stores and allow developers to provide alternative payment options within apps.
It’s worth noting that Apple appears to have exempted iMessage from the new rules. Microsoft’s search engine, Bing, also manages to escape the regulations. You can see which services are included in the image above.
