This year, the European Union celebrates the quarter-century anniversary of its domestic market created in 1993 for the free movement of goods, capital, services and people. The head of the Center for Economic Integration of the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the assistant professor of the International Relations Department at the School of World Politics and Economy of the Higher School of Economics, Natalia Kondratyeva, spoke about the development of the European digital single market.
"Europeans are lagging behind their competitors in terms of the high technology development. There are few European companies working in the field of ICT on the market. Europeans are worried and they are making efforts to help their economy and companies. One of the results of the recent EU summit in Brussels was an arrangement of the intermediate results of the digital single market’s creation. The EU has already done a lot in this direction, "Kondratyeva said.
According to her, the single digital market is not only about buying and selling online: "The result, which the EU is proud of, is the abolition of roaming." The EU institutions and European mobile operators have spent 10 years trying to agree on the abolishment of the payment for roaming. Finally, they showed determination and adopted new, more stringent competition conditions. Many events are taking place in the field of the data protection. This month, the regulations came into force giving Europeans who travel within the single EU market borders the right to maintain online access to the services. In February, a regulation was adopted on the prohibition of geolocation in the area of the single internal market. Each of us has faced geo-blocking, which is a discriminatory practice that prohibits either access to products, prices or transportation services. This issue has been resolved finally. Now European consumers will not experience any inconvenience, there will be no discrimination in this field. "
Natalia Kondratyeva also said that much has been done with respect to the reputation of the digital markets: "This month, the new operational measures have been introduced to combat illegal content on the Internet. There is already a code of conduct and the fight is waged against the illegal practices, there is a memorandum banning the sale of the counterfeit goods. The requirements for the removal of terrorist content within one hour since its appearance have entered into force. Every three months the EU states are obliged to report to the European Commission on cooperation with the companies providing Internet traffic to stop this terrorist activity.
