Metaverse, AI Subsequent Digital Markets to Come Beneath Regulatory Scanner, Says EU Antitrust Chief

The metaverse, shared digital worlds accessible by way of the Internet, is the subsequent digital market to draw regulatory scrutiny, EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager stated on Thursday.

The metaverse has come into sharper focus since Facebook modified its title to Meta Platforms two years in the past to replicate its guess on the brand new sector because the successor to the cellular Internet.

That transfer has in flip triggered considerations about Meta’s attainable dominance. Alphabet’s Google and Microsoft are additionally lively in generative synthetic intelligence that the trade sees as the brand new brilliant spot.

“It’s already time for us to start asking what healthy competition would look like in the metaverse,” Vestager stated a convention organised by Keystone Strategy.

Vestager requested whether or not it could change the equation when there are competing digital realities and language AI fashions like ChatGPT.

“Do we need to do more on something new? And obviously we have started that work,” she stated.

She stated regulatory scrutiny of digital markets has been escalating worldwide within the final three years.

“And there’s a much wider political debate that digital markets need careful attention. I think all jurisdictions are moving forward in one form or another,” Vestager stated.

She stated some antitrust enforcers have been extra superior than others.

“We are moving at different speeds. We will not get the same legal framework. And maybe that is not a bad thing. Because that will allow us to hone our toolkits in the process of mutual learning,” Vestager stated.

© Thomson Reuters 2023