Part IV What are the Risks if Competition Authorities Ignore or Downplay Big Data?, 16 The Price of Weak Antitrust Enforcement

Subject(s):

Agency agreements — Market power — Rights — Internet — Technology — National merger control

This chapter explains why the societal harm is too great to ignore data-driven mergers and abuses by dominant firms. The costs are high when agencies and courts get it wrong, going to the heart of many democratic systems. Anticompetitive data-driven mergers and monopolistic abuses can affect not only consumers’ economic interests but also their privacy interests and the values that underlie these privacy interests, such as individual autonomy and freedom of expression and association. Many of these industries, given the data-driven network effects, are ripe for consolidation. Thus, the incentives for mergers and exclusionary behaviour increase to tip the market towards dominance. Additionally, the chapter explains why privacy and consumer protection agencies and laws will not necessarily prevent these harms through behavioural remedies and fines.