Major digital players may get advice on dos and don’ts

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Digital Competition Law will likely recommend “dos and don’ts” for systemically important digital intermediaries to check big tech’s ability to distort fair trade, a person aware of the panel’s deliberations, said. The panel, chaired by corporate affairs secretary Manoj Govil, is likely to define systemically important digital intermediaries based on a set of criteria including the nature of business, turnover, and user base, both global and local, the person told ET.

However, smaller digital firms will be kept outside the ambit of the new regime, he added. It may suggest a separate law for digital competition, given the fast expansion of the Indian market and the potential of large players to impact fair trade rules across a broad range of businesses, even beyond the digital sector.

The panel will soon finalise its recommendations, having already concluded stakeholder consultations, including with local start-ups and big global players such as Apple, Amazon, Google, Meta, and Twitter, the source said. This comes as some of the large technology players, including Google, Apple, and Facebook, face probes by the competition regulator for possible abuse of fair-trade rules.

“The committee could suggest ex-ante regulations for the large players. Even the EU has adopted ex-ante structural limitations on the practices of large technology platforms.” Large global technology companies have reportedly opposed the idea of ex-ante regulations in India.

Establishing the anti-competitive behaviour of large players under the extant norms typically takes time, given the requirement of thorough investigations by the Competition Commission of India (CCI). Besides, a CCI order can be challenged by aggrieved parties, and by the time the