An Economic Policy Perspective on Online Platforms

Bertin Martens

No 2016-05, JRC Working Papers on Digital Economy from Joint Research Centre

Abstract: This report provides an overview of the relevant economic research literature on platforms or multi-sided online markets. It discusses platforms from a regulatory policy angle, including potential market failures in platforms, the extent of self-regulation and possible regulatory responses through existing competition policy, consumer protection and data protection instruments. It covers selected policy issues associated with these platforms including possible sources of bias in search engines and search rankings, data protection and the use of personal data in platforms, and platform liabilities within and beyond the e-commerce directive.

Keywords: multi-sided markets; digital online platforms; market failure; regulation; e-commerce directive; search engines; data protection; intermediary liabilities (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 57 pages
Date: 2016-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-com, nep-ict, nep-net and nep-reg
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (28)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ipt:decwpa:2016-05

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