Exploitative Abuse Under Competition Law In The Age Of Digital Platforms: Challenges In Regulating Big Tech Markets
- IJLLR Journal
- Jun 4
- 1 min read
Priyanka Kumari & Dr. Mansi Jain Garg
ABSTRACT
The emergence of digital platform economies has fundamentally disrupted the conceptual foundations of competition law. Dominant technology corporations including Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft have leveraged network effects, data accumulation, and multi-sided market architectures to entrench market power in ways that defy traditional regulatory categories. Exploitative abuse, historically understood as the imposition of unfair prices or trading conditions upon consumers, has acquired new dimensions in digital environments: the monetisation of personal data as a currency of market control, and the engineering of consent through information asymmetries. This paper critically analyses the doctrinal contours of exploitative abuse under competition law frameworks with particular attention to the European Union. Drawing upon landmark enforcement actions, legislative reforms including the EU Digital Markets Act, and the Indian Competition (Amendment) Act, 2023, the paper proposes a recalibrated framework premised on structural interventionism, interoperability mandates, and data portability obligations. It is argued that the consumer welfare standard, as currently operationalised, is insufficient to capture the full spectrum of harms inflicted by digital gatekeepers, and that a paradigm shift toward a market contestability standard is both doctrinally justified and practically necessary.
Keywords: Exploitative Abuse, Digital Platforms, Competition Law, Big Tech, Market Dominance, Data Economy, Digital Markets Act, India Competition Act.
