EU gives final touches to law on Big Tech 

Lawmakers in the European Union are giving final touches to a new law that would impact big tech companies like Google, Meta, Apple and Amazon.

AFP quoted sources to say that talks between negotiators from the European Parliament and EU member states on Thuesday may result in an agreement on the legislation.

"We really expect that we can reach an agreement on Thursday, that we can endorse the Digital Markets Act," said French MEP Stephanie Yon-Courtin, a key backer of the law.

This is a "a historic text that will clearly change the rules of the game," she added.

Once adopted, it would give regulators in Brussels unparallelled power to take a close and up-to-the-minute look at business decisions by the giants, especially when they acquire promising startups.

The rules would also set a list of do’s and don’ts including forcing Apple to open up its app store to competing payment systems -- a demand the iPhone maker has resisted arduously in courts for years.

The Digital Markets Act (DMA) could also force Google and Meta-owned Facebook to reveal precious information from their world-dominating ad platforms, potentially leaving them vulnerable to new rivals.

In their final push, lawmakers from the European Parliament would also like to impose interoperability between messaging systems such as WhatsApp, Signal or Apple’s iMessage.

Violation of the rules could lead to fines as high as 10 percent of annual global sales with some MEPs calling for even tougher penalties for repeat offenders.

The big tech companies have lobbied hard against the new rules.

(With inputs from agencies)