Why do Competition Authorities need Artificial Intelligence?

• Authors: Isabella Lorenzoni

Abstracts

FR

Les récents développements technologiques transforment la manière don’t les règles de la concurrence sont appliquées et la manière dont les acteurs du marché enfreignent le droit de la concurrence. En conséquence, les autorités ont commencé à se doter d’outils d’investigation numériques sophistiqués. Cet article explore cet intérêt à construire un arsenal basé sur l’Intelligence Artificielle pour lutter contre les infractions algorithmiques. Quels sont les principaux facteurs qui motivent les autorités à développer leur propre équipement technologique pour faire respecter le droit de la concurrence ? En s’appuyant sur des entretiens avec certaines autorités de la concurrence, cet article constate que les changements survenus sur les marchés numériques, la nécessité d’appliquer la rétro-ingénierie aux algorithmes des entreprises afin de mieux comprendre leurs implications pour le droit de la concurrence, la nécessité d’améliorer l’efficacité et de suivre le rythme de l’évolution rapide de l’économie numérique, et enfin la diminution des demandes de clémence, sont autant de raisons pour lesquelles les autorités de concurrence devraient rechercher des moyens plus innovants et alternatifs pour dynamiser leurs enquêtes.

EN

Recent technological developments are transforming the way antitrust is enforced as well as the way market players are infringing competition law. As a result, enforcers are starting to equip themselves with sophisticated digital investigation tools. This paper explores this interest in building an Artificial Intelligence (AI) arsenal for the fight against algorithmic infringements. What are the key factors motivating regulators to develop their own technological tools to enforce competition law? Building on interviews with a number of competition authorities, this paper finds that changes in digital markets, the need for enforcers to reverseengineer companies’ algorithms in order to better understand their implications for competition law, the need to enhance efficiency and keep pace with the fast

Keywords

EN

Artificial Intelligence; Competition law; enforcement; digital economy; digital market

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Warszawski. Wydawnictwo Naukowe Wydziału Zarządzania
• Journal: Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies
• Year: 2022
• Volume: 15
• Issue: 26
• Pages: 33-56

Dates

published

2022

Contributors

author

Isabella Lorenzoni

• University of Luxembourg

• https://orcid.org/0000000280041130

References

• Abrantes-Metz R M, ‘Proactive vs Reactive Anti-Cartel Policy: The Role of Empirical Screens’ (8th European Summer School and Conference in Competition and Regulation, Corfu, Greece, July 2013).
• Abrantes-Metz R M and Metz A D, ‘Can Machine Learning aid in Cartel Detection?’ (2018) CPI Antitrust Chronicle 1.
• Akman P, ‘Competition Policy in a Globalized, Digitalized Economy’ (World Economic Forum White paper 2019).
• AlgorithmWatch, ‘Automating Society: Taking Stock of Automated Decision-Making in the EU’ (2019).
• Azzolina S, Razza M, Sartiano K and Weitschek E, ‘Price Discrimination in the Online Airline Market: An Empirical Study’ (2021) 16 Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research, 2282.
• Borrell J-R, Jiménez J L and Ordóñez-de-Haro J M, ‘The Leniency Program: Obstacles on the way to collude’ (2015) 3 Journal of Antitrust Enforcement 149.
• Brand V, ‘Corporate Whistleblowing, Smart Regulation and Regtech: The Coming of the Whistlebot?’ (2020) 43(3) University of New South Wales Law Journal 1.
• Bundeskartellamt & Autorité de la concurrence, ‘Algorithms and Competition’ (2019) Working Paper.
• Buttà A, Pezzoli A, Razza M and Weitschek E, ‘Inferire il funzionamento degli algoritmi nelle piattaforme di e-commerce con il machine learning – aspetti di tutela della concorrenza e del consumatore’ (Ital-IA 2022 – Workshop AI per la Pubblica Amministrazione, February 2022).
• Chimuka G, ‘Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Patent Law. Towards a New Analytical Framework – [the Multi-Level Model]’ (2019) 59 World Patent Information 101926.
• Cobbe J, ‘Administrative Law and the Machines of Government: Judicial Review of Automated Public-Sector Decision-Making’ (2019) 39 Legal Studies 636.
• Jennifer Cobbe, Michelle Seng Ah Lee, and Jatinder Singh ‘Reviewable Automated Decision-Making: A Framework for Accountable Algorithmic Systems’ (ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT ‘21), March 1–10, 2021, Virtual Event, Canada. ACM New York, USA).
• Coglianese C and Lai A, ‘Antitrust by Algorithm’ (2022) 2 Stanford Journal of Computational Antitrust 1.
• Coglianese C and Lehr D, ‘Regulating by Robot: Administrative Decision Making in the Machine-Learning Era’ (2017) 105 Georgetown Law Journal 1147.
• Colombo N, ‘Virtual Competition: Human Liability Vis-À-Vis Artificial Intelligence’s Anticompetitive Behaviours’ (2018) 1 CoRe 11.
• Competition & Markets Authority, ‘Algorithms: How they can reduce competition and harm consumers’ (2021).
• Competition Policy International ‘CPI Talks…with Cani Fernández’ (CPI 27 September 2020) https://www.competitionpolicyinternational.com/cpi-talks-with-cani-fernandez/.
• Conseil de la Concurrence of Luxembourg, ‘Annual report 2020’ (2020).
• Deng A, ‘From the Dark Side to the Bright Side: Exploring Algorithmic Antitrust Compliance’ (2019 NERA Economic Consulting and Johns Hopkins University).
• Devillé R, Sergeyssels N and Middag C, ‘Basic Concepts of AI for Legal Scholars’, in Jan De Bruyne and Cedric Vanleenhove (eds), Artificial Intelligence and the Law (Intersentia 2021).
• Dijkstra P T and Frisch J, ‘Sanctions and Leniency to Individuals, and its Impact on Cartel Discoveries: Evidence from the Netherlands’ (2018) 166 De Economist 111.
• Espinoza J, ‘EU Struggles to Build Antitrust Case against Amazon’ Financial Times (2021) https://www.ft.com/content/d5bb5ebb-87ef-4968-8ff5-76b3a215eefc.
• Ezrachi A and Stucke M E, Virtual Competition: The Promise and Perils of the Algorithmdriven Economy (Cambridge Mass. London: Harvard U, 2016).
• Ezrachi A and Stucke M E, ‘Artificial Intelligence & Collusion: When Computers Inhibit Competition’ (2017) 5 University of Illinois Law Review 1775.
• Fetzer T, Kosack D, Paulheim H and Schlechtinger M, ‘How algorithms work and play together’ (2021) 3 Artificial Intelligence and Competition Law – Concurrences 19.
• Fountoukakos K, ‘Interview with María Luisa Tierno Centella (CNMC) by Kyriakos Fountoukakos (Herbert Smith Freehills)’ (3rd Cartels Workshop: An advanced seminar on substantive and procedural EU developments Workshop I – Substantive Issues, Wednesday 19 January 2022 – Concurrences).
• Hofmann CH H, ‘An Introduction to Automated Decision-making (ADM) and Cyber-Delegation in the Scope of EU Public Law’ (2021) Indigo Working Paper.
• Johnson J and Sokol D D, ‘Understanding AI Collusion and Compliance’ in D Daniel Sokol and Benjamin van Rooij (eds), Cambridge Handbook of Compliance (SSRN 2020).
• Katz M L and Melamed A D, ‘Competition law as common law: American express and the evolution of antitrust’ (2020) 168 University of Pennsylvania Law Review 2061.
• Lianos I, ‘Computational Competition Law and Economics: Issues, Prospects – An Inception Report’ (2021) Hellenic Competition Commission.
• Mattiuzzo M and Machado H F, ‘Algorithmic Governance in Computational Antitrust – a Brief Outline of Alternatives for Policymakers’ (2022) 2 Stanford Journal of Computational Antitrust 23.
• Pavel Dobre V, ‘Old rules for new practices: Tying in the digital era’ (2021) 2 Competition policy in the digital economy – Concurrences 35.
• Quinn H, Brand K and Hunt S, ‘Algorithms: helping competition authorities be cognizant of the harms, build their capabilities and act’ (2021) 3 Artificial Intelligence and Competition Law – Concurrences 5.
• Robertson L, ‘Latin American and Caribbean Competition Forum – Session I: Digital Evidence Gathering in Cartel Investigations − Contribution from Spain’ (OECD 28−29 September 2020).
• Robertson H S E V, ‘Antitrust market definition for digital ecosystems’ (2021) 2 Competition policy in the digital economy – Concurrences 3.
• Schrepel T, ‘Computational Antitrust: An Introduction and Research Agenda’ (2021) 1 Stanford Journal of Computational Antitrust, 1.
• Schrepel T, ‘Antitrust Without Romance’ (2020) New York University Journal of Law & Liberty 326.
• Sokol D D and Ma J, ‘Understanding Online Markets and Antitrust Analysis’ (2017) 15 Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property 43.
• Steinbaum M and Stucke M E, ‘The Effective Competition Standard A New Standard for Antitrust’ (2018) Roosevelt Institute.
• Villafranco J E et al., ‘Competition Implications of Big Data and Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning’ (White Paper 2/2021 ‘Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning: Emerging Legal and Self-Regulatory Considerations’ American Bar Association Antitrust Law Section Big Data Task Force <https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/antitrust_law/comments/feb-21/aba-big-data-task-force-whitepaper-part-two-final-215.pdf> accessed 10 March 2022).
• Von Bonin A and Malhi S, ‘The Use of Artificial Intelligence in the Future of Competition Law Enforcement’ (2020) 11 Journal of European Competition Law & Practice 468.
• Wismer S and Rasek A, ‘Market definition in multi-sided markets’ (OECD 21–23 June 2017).
• Yang Y, Zhang K and Kannan P.K, ‘Identifying Market Structure: A Deep Network Representation Learning of Social Engagement’ (2021) Journal of Marketing 1.
• Ysewyn J and Kahmann S, ‘The decline and fall of the leniency programme in Europe’ (2018) 1 Concurrences 44.

Identifiers

DOI

10.7172/1689-9024.YARS.2022.15.26.2

Biblioteka Nauki

2159085