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Microsoft Fined €561 Million For Non-compliance With EU Browser Settlement
Seeteufel writes "Microsoft's failure to comply with an antitrust settlement about browser choice has severe consequences. The European Commissioner for Competition Almunia set a fine of €561 million (~$732 million) for the unprecedented break of agreement. Microsoft admitted its mistakes and offered further concessions."
A pretty costly bug it seems. From the EC press release: "This is the first time that the Commission has had to fine a company for non-compliance with a commitments decision. In the calculation of the fine the Commission took into account the gravity and duration of the infringement, the need to ensure a deterrent effect of the fine and, as a mitigating circumstance, the fact that Microsoft has cooperated with the Commission and provided information which helped the Commission to investigate the matter efficiently."
I can't believe that a company in 2013 would have the audacity to think it can still get away with bundling its own browser with its OS! You'd never see this sort of behavior out of more responsible corporations like Apple.
Even as a Microsoft hater of old, I'm beginning to feel sorry for MS. For sure, 15 years ago they were engaged in monopoly abuse to advantage IE. But these days, IE itself is on the way out. WebKit based browsers are the clear majority these days. And neither Apple nor Google have to offer users of their systems a choice of browser.
It must really rub salt in the wound to have a statutory obligation to offer alternatives to their minority browser.
Has a fine like this *ever* been paid in the U.S. though in actuality?
It either gets fed to the appeals system which reduces it or ties the payment up for so long it's meaningless or it gets ignored and forgotten.
I can't remember one example of a company just paying the fine and moving on, actually. Does someone else here remember anything like this?
There is virtually ZERO chance/probability that this was a Microsoft bug.
It sure is a *fine* story!
Who ever said fines were supposed to be proportional to perceived severity of crime? Especially across different judicial systems.
Fines need to take account of ability to pay. And they also need to be designed to be of a size that will stop reoffending. GIven that Microsoft have reoffended, that's a good indication that the original fine wasn't big enough.
How can they allow software which doesn't exist to run on they're operating system? You'd probably have been better off attempting a car analogy.
This was done under EU anti-monopoly legislation. Microsoft was at the time judged to have a monopoly share of the PC OS market. And as such they couldn't use that monopoly to leverage advantage into the web browser market.
Since neither Google nor Apple have monopoly shares in any OS platform, they should not and cannot be required to do this.
One could argue that since Microsoft Windows is now on the slide, and WebKit based browsers are now the market leader, that the anti-monopoly action against Microsoft is no longer necessary. However that is for a court to decide. Not for Microsoft to simply disregard their obligation.
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh cut the amount Samsung is obligated to pay Apple by about $450.5 million, or nearly 43%, to $598.9 million.
And Microsoft is fined $732 million for not complying with a court order / ruling?
You're comparing a civil suit in one country to a criminal fine in another. Why bother comparing, they're completely different things.
Mean while in america we fine 1.92 billion HSBC for laundering money for terrorists and drug lords. Apparently laundering money for terrorists and drug lords is only 2.5 (roughly) times as bad as not complying with an EU court settlement.
Neither is as bad as sharing a song over bittorrent.
No sig today...
The browsers are not just bundled but Apple doesn't even allow other browser engines like Firefox's Gecko to run on the iDevices. The maximum you can do as a browser maker is to put a different skin on top of the Safari renderer. Chromebooks don't even allow browsers.
That means there won't even be a Netscape equivalent to complain about bundling because alternate browsers are just plain banned. Software freedom and choice is more dead in the post-PC world than it was in the PC world.
This space for rent.
For Security!
No, I'm serious. Vague handwaving about "security" seems to make all kinds of human rights abuses "okay." So UEFI secure boot is clearly good for everyone. I mean, it has "secure" right in the name! That must make it good! We should all thank Microsoft for making our BIOS's "secure"! After all, once the BIOS is "secure," we can use it to make the whole system secure! Right? Right....?
Microsoft can get away with UEFI Secureboot right now because it's for security. But it happens to coincide with a move in the industry away from PC's as PCs. People are buying tablets as entertainment devices (you still can't do real work on them) instead of PCs. I don't think that the anti-trust courts are really going to pay much attention to this one.
One could argue that since Microsoft Windows is now on the slide, and WebKit based browsers are now the market leader, that the anti-monopoly action against Microsoft is no longer necessary. However that is for a court to decide. Not for Microsoft to simply disregard their obligation.
*Plus*, just because a remedy is no longer necessary does not mean it shouldn't still happen. That's the nature of punishments.
"Oh, Mr Murderer, you're not currently killing anyone? Well then be on your way, you little scamp!"
what about the windows RT lock down and the win 8 app store how will that go under EU rules?
Yes, you are, and so is every other person who's already posted the same thing as you.
Microsoft were referred to the EU Competition Commission due to a complain by Opera. They were found to hold a monopoly on desktop Operating Systems. They were found to be using this monopoly to illegally extend their monopoly into another market, namely web browsers. The original action (being forced to provide Browser Choice) was intended to address their illegal action. Microsoft subsequently ignored this, for 14 months, all the time claiming that they were in compliance. This fine is a result of their actions in ignoring a previous agreement with the EU.
You can stamp your feet and whine all you like, but that's the law and those are the facts.
Apple are not expected to comply with the same rules before they have not been referred to the EU Competition Commission and thus legally there is no monopoly status, and therefore can not be using that monopoly to extend their market in other areas.
If you believe that Apple are a monopoly and that they are harming consumers through their actions relating to that monopoly, please feel free to complain to the EU Competition Commission.
not necessary now doesn't mean that it didn't happen, of which they were found guilty. The fact that even after they were found guilty they continued to let it happen and denied it, is why they are now seeking this to be a deterrent.
If you think MS is not doing anything anti-monopoly, I'd like to remind you of the UEFI BIOS issue.
They don't have a monopoly OR an antitrust settlement to break.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
IE6 lock-in is still causing harm now, over a decade after it was first inflicted on us.
The laws regarding monopolies and anti-competitive behavior are more complex than the simple dictionary definition of "monopoly". Microsoft was convicted of abusing a monopoly position, and now has to deal with the results of that conviction.
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
Microsoft is no longer the monopoly it once was. Furthermore, Apple is doing far more egrarious violations. What about the fact that Apple refused to convert to microUSB with the new iPhone 5. Where is there fine.
At least Microsoft lets me install an alternative browser (crApple, did their darndest to prevent even that)
Most Linux dists with Firefox and I suppose Android may have a standard browser to.
Microsoft were abusing their position to ensure other browsers couldn't be bundled as part of the OEM software builds distributed with new PCs. PC makers were literally not permitted to add any other browsers. See this US Dept. of Justice link, section V.C.2 for a summary. This was Microsoft's strategy for winning the browser wars against Netscape Navigator, and was the reason Netscape died out.
Then they integrated their Internet Explorer browser into the operating system so deeply that you can't actually uninstall it. Internet Explorer is present on EVERY copy of Windows released, whether the user wants to actually use it or not.
This is different from Linux distros distributing Firefox as part of their bundle for a number of reasons - chief of which is that Firefox isn't made by the Linux Foundation, it's a Mozilla product. Secondly, it's been a while since I installed Ubuntu, but I'm pretty certain when I did, the installer asked me which browser(s) I wanted (amongst other software) - it's not like Firefox was just given to me, I could have picked Chrome if I'd wanted to use it.
The reason Microsoft are being targeted here is that this is an anti-trust fine. Microsoft are recognized as the leader in the consumer and enterprise desktop/laptop PC OS markets - there are more Windows installs than there are Linux or Mac installs. By bundling their own browser and not giving users the option during installation NOT to install IE (let alone giving them the option to install something else), they could be viewed as using their dominance in the desktop OS market as a tool to gain dominance in the web browser market. Remember that a lot of consumers will also just go with whatever is installed, either through ignorance (they don't know how good other browsers are, and IE just works, right?) or through not feeling confident / tech savvy enough to install a different browser. You have to go download files and run installers and make choices - that sort of thing scares people, which is why the App Store model is so popular - you just click "install" and it goes and does it all for you. Putting the choice of browser in the installation wizard for the OS or in the "first-time user login" wizard when you first start up your brand new PC should even the playing field, giving users an easy way of picking what browser they want to use. Granted, most will continue using IE because that's what they've been used to in the past, or because of the Microsoft branding on it - but that's their choice.
Having the Chrome browser bundled with Android is pretty much the same as Microsoft including IE with Windows and Apple including Safari with MacOS and iOS - yes there are other browsers available, but they don't give you the choice what you want. There is no reason why the European Commissioner for Competition can't go and levy the same sorts of fines against Google and Apple for the same reasons (maybe they haven't received complaints about this practice by these companies?). It's just been Microsoft's turn this time, and the fine they're being hit with is because of their failure to comply with an earlier ruling - they were told previously to give users a choice, and this demand has basically been ignored.
OH THE HUMANITY! THE HORRORS! I HAVE TO CHANGE BROWSER MYSELF?!
You don't have to change it at all if you don't want to. The point is, it's about having the choice. You may have the technical know-how to do this, but a lot of people won't, so Microsoft win the browser wars by default.
He's Jesus, for Christ's sake.
IE6 lock-in is still causing harm now, over a decade after it was first inflicted on us.
Surely the majority of the blame for that should go to companies like Netscape for not providing a decent alternative for such a long time. The beginning of the fall of Internet Explorer came with the release of Firefox.
Of course, you could say that Opera was around during that period, but even today when more and more people find alternatives to the bundled browser nobody hardly anybody chooses Opera.
The fine is a deterrent, and a sign that in Europe, the government is more powerful than business interests. Guess all those years of fascism left a mark. Score 1-0 for democracy and rule of law.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
An estimated 70,000 people die every day as a result of being locked into IE6.
Surely the majority of the blame for that should go to companies like Netscape for not providing a decent alternative for such a long time.
lol!
IE6 was a disaster from a technological point of view, but Microsoft sure got a lot of vendor lock-in from it!!!
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
They tested whether they could get away with it and arranged some (fairly transparent) level of deniability. It is really simple: This feature was on the "must work" list for all releases. Such items cannot simply be overlooked unless you are really, really, really incompetent. Not even MS manages to reach this level and certainly not for that long.
Well, now they know that they cannot get away with more of this immoral and economically damaging (to all but them) business practice. I also think the EU put the fine on the low end, even given their "cooperation".
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
IE6 was a disaster from a technological point of view, but Microsoft sure got a lot of vendor lock-in from it!!!
I don't think that it was that bad, and it was still better than anything else available at the time. As much as I hated the concept of Active-X, the technology did fill a need and was used quite a lot - hence the lock-in with company's Intranets, etc.
It was a huge pain in the arse when it was disabled though, as almost every page load caused a prompt to appear to warn that Active-X was off.
I'm looking around and I can't see Win8 having a significant percent of the market (maybe I can't see because it's night time, but anyway...) what monopoly are you talking about?
The one that will exist once it becomes difficult to buy a PC with Windows 7, more and more new software/upgraded requires Windows 8 and the legions of Windows 7 and XP users sigh, give up and upgrade to Windows 8.
The one that means that so many people are putting up with the horrible ribbon interface in Office because they need to be able to exchange files reliably with other Office users.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Just how is it a pain to use other browsers or search engines on Windows 7?
... reading the posts here is that Microsoft went out of their way to make sure IE in any form was integral to the operation of Windows.
So MS _deliberately_ made sure that other browser run worse than IE on a Windows system.
Then, after the original court order, they couldn't really backtrack to what they insisted that 'IE cannot be removed' and offer a choice of browsers to use.
I'm pretty sure that if you or I came to an agreement with a court based on a crime we'd committed and then "accidentally overlooked" adhering to that agreement, we'd be nailed for it, so I don't see why Microsoft should get off just because they're a corporation rather than a person (which is still the case outside the US as far as I'm aware).
The fine is not for the crime, it's for breaching the agreement.
And I'm not saying don't hit MS hard. But this is 732 Million dollars for a browser infraction. At a time where the reality is the citizens of Europe do not have a broswer monopoly problem. Its fucking lunacy.
Not really. Microsoft was found guilty a while ago, a fine was calculated, and the fine was reduced because Microsoft agreed to do certain things. They didn't, so they have to pay the additional fine.
It doesn't matter that the actual problem has gone away. There are many people in jail for murder who haven't killed anyone for many years.
Microsoft was convicted and lost the appeal. If you were on parole and violated it they would nail you even if it was an accident!
It isn't fair when a human on parole forgets some legal detail and is nailed. That's 1 person who is not a lawyer trying to continue living their life. Microsoft is a large number of people with their own law firms who are paid to deal with such things. ZERO EXCUSES for almost any human (except the politically connected) and they can have reasonable excuses; Microsoft doesn't.
Just because they are a corporation (that is, a person in the USA) doesn't mean they should get special treatment.
The fact the EU can even fine them a decent amount shows they can't just bribe their way out of the legal system; like in the USA... Weak punishments just become part of doing business, nothing changes - the whole purpose is to force compliance!
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