Microsoft punsished by European Union Consumer Regulator

The European Union consumer regulators (the EU) have fined Microsoft for failing to give an estimated 15 million consumers the right to choose a web browser. The fine results from Microsoft's failure to offer a choice of more than one browser on their operating system. Regulators have held this to be a violation of a voluntary antitrust pact that Microsoft had entered into with the EU.

Punishment a First

The punishment is said to be a first in that the EU has never before punished a group for breaching a settlement and certainly not to the value of 561 million Euros as in this case. The fine is described by the EU Regulators as being intended to “punish and deter”, companies and impress on them that they “must do what they committed to do or face the consequences”. According to reports the fine is equal to about 1 percent of Microsoft’s global turnover.

Google Spilled the Beans

The technical press reports that the violation of the antitrust pact by Microsoft was drawn to the attention of the EU Regulators by Google and Opera whoose competiton with Microsoft foe web browser prominence is well known.

What the Penalty Means

The Conversation reports that:

The penalty signals that Europe’s regulators are getting tough. It’s a message to Google and Facebook, which dominate the EU markets for online search and social networks, pay derisory amounts of tax and have been unresponsive to requests by provincial, national and EU-wide regulators.

The penalty is an echo of the 'Microsoft Wars' – major litigation over software – of the last decade, in which competitors complained that Microsoft was abusing a tacit monopoly and the US government had indifferent success with antitrust litigation.

While Tech Hub reports that for Microsoft's competitors, particularly Google, the penalty is:

"... a double-edged victory ... given it is in the later stages of its own EU settlement negotiations. Microsoft’s lapse, which went unnoticed for more than a year, is prompting [the EU Regulator to] consider putting more rigorous monitoring conditions in future deals."

The important outcome from a consumer law perspective is that in Europe at least regulators are prepared to deal quite severly with large multinationals who disregard their committments to fair competition and deal with them severly.

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