EU: Vestager takes aim at “biopower” of tech giants

Global tech giants have been sowing the seeds of an economy predicated on “biopower,” in an attempt to “set their own standards and conditions” amid the EU’s attempts to rein in their dominance, the bloc’s Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager told EURACTIV in an exclusive interview.

Vestager, who will also be responsible for “making Europe fit for the digital age”’ as part of her upcoming mandate as an Executive Vice-President, also revealed that the European Commission is in talks with the French competition authorities in order to examine whether a further investigation into Google’s stance on the EU’s copyright directive is necessary.

The news comes following French President Emmanuel Macron’s recent request for competition authorities to probe Google’s recent changes of service that will result in the company avoiding the legal obligation to remunerate press publishers for the displaying of links to online articles in search results.

“We’re in contact with the French competition authorities, in order to see what would they do, to see if they would want to handle the question or if we should have a look,” Vestager said, adding that the objective of modernising the EU’s copyright rules was to ensure than online content creators “should be remunerated.”

Full Content: EurActiv

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