The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has addressed a number of its key concerns about the growing economic power and influence of digital platforms, declaring that competition enforcement and regulation must keep pace.
Chair of the ACCC Rod Sims (pictured) said the Commission’s recent actions against Google were about holding powerful digital platform businesses accountable for representations made to consumers.
Speaking to business people in Western Australia via a streaming video last week, Mr Sims said the ACCC believed consumers had the right to know and make informed choices about their use of digital services, particularly how their personal data is being collected and used for the supposedly free services.
“They are not free; everything has a cost,” Mr Sims said.
He said there was a need to address the bargaining power imbalances between Australian news media businesses and digital platforms. Note, PS News is an Australian news medium.
Mr Sims said the ACCC was also concerned about how past and future acquisitions of rivals by the digital platforms could entrench their market power, providing them with advantages of scale and reducing competition.
“What we don’t want is for large platforms such as Google and Facebook to remove possible rivals that may have otherwise emerged, possibly in partnership with others, as vigorous and effective competitors to their core services,” he said.
Mr Sims said existing regulatory frameworks had not held up well to the challenges of digitalisation.
“Of course our focus is on both consumer and competition enforcement and regulation, so investigating and pursuing what needs to be done to protect consumers and allow businesses to compete on their merits in the growing digital economy is now a core part of the our work, as it needs to be,” he said.
The full text of Mr Sims’ address can be accessed at this PS News link.
