The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) last year lost a lawsuit against Microsoft over its merger with Activision Blizzard King. As a result, this allowed the deal to close despite ongoing regulatory appeals. A year has passed since the purchase of Activision, and now it has become known about a new confrontation between Microsoft and the FTC.
Today, Bloomberg and The Verge, citing their sources, report the beginning of a large-scale investigation by the FTC against Microsoft. According to media reports, the regulator became interested in the American corporation due to possible violations of antitrust laws.
The US Federal Trade Commission’s investigation against Microsoft is aimed at a detailed study of the cloud business, cybersecurity, software licensing segment and the field of AI. Recently, problems arose with the security of Microsoft services, which became one of the triggers for starting an investigation.
Note that the last time Microsoft faced a large-scale investigation of its own activities (not at the time of mergers) by antitrust control was back in the 90s due to the combination of the browser and Windows. At the same time, the FTC has regularly had complaints against Amazon, Apple, and Google in recent years.
