The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has published a report of its inquiry into the impact of digital platforms on competition in Australia’s media and advertising markets.
The inquiry took particular interest in the effects of search engines, social media platforms and content aggregation platforms on the supply of news and journalistic content.
The ACCC report contains 23 recommendations spanning competition law, consumer protection, media regulation and privacy law.
Chair of the ACCC, Rod Sims said the recommendations dealt with the many competition, consumer, privacy and news media issues identified during the inquiry.
“Importantly, our recommendations are dynamic in that they will provide the framework and the information that Governments and communities will need to address further issues as they arise,” Mr Sims said.
“The ACCC identified many adverse effects associated with digital platforms, many of which flow from the dominance of Google and Facebook.”
He said these included the market power of Google and Facebook distorting the ability of businesses to compete on their merits; opaque digital advertising markets with highly uncertain money flows; and consumers inadequately informed about how their data was collected and used.
He noted that Australian society had been impacted by disinformation and a rising mistrust of news.
“The dominant digital platforms’ response to the issues we have raised might best be described as ‘trust us’,” Mr Sims said.
“The issues we have uncovered during this inquiry are too important to be left to the companies themselves.”
He said action on consumer law and privacy issues, as well as on competition law and policy, would all be crucial in dealing with the problems associated with the digital platforms’ market power and the accumulation of consumers’ data.
“The ACCC recommends the Government establish a specialist digital platforms branch within the ACCC…to proactively monitor and investigate potentially anti-competitive conduct by digital platforms,” Mr Sims said.
“One of the first tasks of the new branch should be to conduct an inquiry into the supply of ad-tech services and the supply of online advertising services by advertising and media agencies.”
The ACCC’s 619-page report can be accessed at this PS News link.
