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Australia’s Digital Platform Inquiry: We’ve Only Just Begun…

By  |  December 18, 2019

Between 2017-2019 the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission con- ducted a “world rst” inquiry into digital platforms and their impact on media and advertising services markets. Its focus was Google and Facebook re ecting their “in uence, size and signi cance” in Australia. Concluding that these platforms have market power, the Final Report makes a raft of recommendations traversing competition, consumer, privacy, media and broader public interest concerns. In the competition space, minor recommendations were made with respect to Aus- tralia’s merger laws and processes and a targeted recommendation is made that Google remove default search and browser preferences from Android devices. The Report also calls for the establishment of a specialist ACCC branch tasked with pro-active monitoring and enforcement and armed with compulsory informa- tion gathering powers to conduct market inquiries and make recommendations to government.