The US equivalent of the Swedish Competition Authority, FTC, has sued Facebook to maintain a monopoly in social media, including through acquisitions of competitors.
The most high-profile case is the US Department of Justice's lawsuit against Google, which is accused of consolidating a search monopoly, among other things because the company's search engine is pre-installed on mobile phones.
In another case, Google is accused of maintaining a monopoly on online advertising.
Dina Srinivasan, a lawyer with a background in online advertising, has been hired as a consultant by Texas state prosecutor Ken Paxton, who is running the case along with 14 other states.
Under heavy pressure
- In the US, we now have three different cases against Google at the same time.
I think they are under too much pressure to escape.
The lawsuits will take years, in the meantime we should pursue the issue of legislation, she thinks.
The trend is in that direction.
What we saw happening recently in Australia, with the government threatening to legislate against Google and Facebook to force them to pay to link to and share articles from news media, more countries may follow suit.
In the EU, the Commission proposes legislation aimed at tech companies that are so large that they are automatically classified as "gatekeepers" and thus forced to live up to special anti-competitive rules.
- Then it becomes clear what your obligations are and what you are not allowed to do, says EU Commissioner Margrethe Vestager with responsibility for competition issues.
Hoping for adjusted playing field
Petra Wikström, head of policy issues at the media group Schibsted, hopes that the EU will adjust the game plan so that the old media companies can compete with the new, tech giants.
- The bill in the EU would require transparency from Google and Facebook and make it more difficult for them to collect data for their online advertising, she says.
Schibsted has now started advertising collaboration with former competitor Bonnier, something that would have been unthinkable a few years ago.
- Our view of the market has changed radically in just five years.
Nowadays, we exclusively see the global tech giants as our competitors, states Alexander Lydecker, commercial manager at Bonnier News.