Report from CNBC
In Brief – The European Commission has directed Google on how to open its Android system to AI rivals and share its search data with online search competitors. The orders are part of two Digital Markets Act (DMA) “specification proceedings” in which the bloc’s antitrust officials use their authority under the digital competition law to direct a “gatekeeper” on how to comply with the regulatory regime. Google must make 11 Android features available to competing AI assistants, allowing services such as OpenAI’s to access core Android device functions and compete more directly with Google’s Gemini. These Android changes will take effect with the next Android release in July 2027 and will only be available to companies determined to meet EU security and privacy requirements. The Commission also ordered Google to share anonymized search engine optimization data with competing AI chatbots and search engines beginning in January, again subject to cybersecurity and data protection assessments, as well as a regulated pricing formula. Google criticized the ruling, arguing it threatens user privacy and security.
Context – While tech company fines garner headlines, DMA specification proceedings are the meat and potatoes of the EU imposing utility-style regulation onto complex digital platforms. Apple, the platform giant with a walled garden business model that has been very popular with consumers, is two years into a pair of specification proceedings directing how it gives peripherals competitors, such as smart watches and headphones, full access to iPhone and iOS capabilities. The company continues to argue that the demands harm user experience and threaten privacy. Apple submitted their own views to the commission on the Google proceedings, warning that the regulator’s plans to force Google to open up Android on AI could weaken privacy, security, device integrity and summed up their disdain for commission officials determining the nuances of how technical services operate, saying, “The EC is redesigning an OS (operating system). It is substituting judgments made by Google’s engineers for its own judgment based on less than three months of work.”