The UK’s Competition and Market Authority (CMA) has transformed its role from a watchful observer to a powerful enforcer in the digital realm, with Google as its first major target. The designation of Google with “strategic market status” is the first flexing of new legislative muscles that signal a much tougher stance on Big Tech.
Previously, the CMA had to conduct lengthy, backward-looking investigations to prove that a company had broken competition law, a process that could take years, by which time the market had often moved on. The new Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 changes the game completely.
The “strategic market status” (SMS) designation allows the CMA to be proactive. It can now impose forward-looking “conduct requirements” on the most powerful firms to prevent them from harming competition in the first place. This shifts the burden onto the designated firms to prove their conduct is fair, rather than on the regulator to prove it is illegal.
The powers are substantial. The CMA can dictate aspects of product design (like choice screens), algorithmic behavior (fair ranking), and business relationships (publisher contracts). It can also back these rules up with the threat of massive fines—up to 10% of a company’s global annual turnover—for non-compliance.
This evolution from a watchdog that barks to an enforcer that can bite marks a new era of digital governance in the UK. Google is the first to feel this shift, but with investigations into other platforms underway, the entire tech sector must now reckon with a regulator that has more power and a clear willingness to use it.