Microsoft's actions investigated again by the European Commission

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The European Commission has recently extended its formal probes launched on
14 January 2008 against Microsoft in two cases where it has been alleged
that the multinational firm had abused its dominant market position.

The first case was brought by a complaint from web browser Opera, which
complained that the tying of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer to its Windows
operating system was anti-competitive.

The second case under investigation was the complaint filed by the European
Committee for Interoperable Systems for the Microsoft’s refusal to disclose
interoperability information on some Microsoft server products, Office and
NET Framework. In relation to this case the Commission also intends to
verify Office Open XML (OOXML) file format for not working with its
competitors’ specifications.

In the latter case, the Commission will also check possible influence of the
the votes by the company during the ISO standardization process for the
OOXML document format. The Commission has asked Microsoft to provide
information about its activities during the process wanting to know whether
the software firm has put pressure on committees in various countries to
ratify OOXML as a standard.

ISO members refused to adopt OOXML in September of 2007 and Microsoft was
asked to make improvements before the final vote that will take place at the
end of February 2008 in Geneva. The Association for a Free Information
Infrastructure had revealed, even before the September vote that there were
some irregularities in the Microsoft’s participation in the committees,
calling for the ceasing of the standardization process. Among other charges,
Microsoft is suspected of having bought votes in Sweden, of hindering the
participation of the competition by limiting the number of seats and by
“hijacking” standardization committees in some countries, including the US,
Mexico and Columbia.

EU looks into Microsoft’s influence on ISO standardization process
(08.02.2008)
http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/103201/

EU investigates Microsoft’s OOXML campaign (08.02.2008)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/02/08/ooxml_eu_probe_iso/

Microsoft faces additional European antitrust probe (08.02.2008)
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/microsoft-faces-additional-european-antitrust/story.aspx?guid=%7B8DFD1635-FBF2-4B3B-AF0C-F57A2C4458B8%7D

EDRi-gram: Opera complains to the EC on Microsoft’s Internet Explorer
(19.12.2007)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.24/opera-commission-microsoft

EDRi-gram: Reactions on the ISO voting procedures (12.09.2007)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.17/iso-procedures