Some 25 organisations (the vast majority of respondents), including the BCA, support the CMA’s eventual Strategic Market Status (“SMS”) designation of Microsoft’s business software ecosystem, and various respondents raise issues concerning Microsoft’s conduct designed to favour its browser, Edge, at the expense of free user choice.
In its response to the CMA’s Invitation to Comment the BCA emphasises that Microsoft’s tactics leverage its dominant Windows OS and M365 productivity software suite to frustrate users’ choice of browsers, thereby damaging the user experience and lowering productivity for millions of businesse+s in the UK. This undermines the efforts of many differentiated, innovative browser developers to compete and reach new audiences, many of them being smaller developers who are especially vulnerable to Microsoft’s tactics.
And the BCA is far from alone in its concerns. In fact, almost a quarter of respondents to the ITC raised concerns with Microsoft’s anti-choice practices in respect of browsers, including the global portfolio rebates that secure blanket exclusive preinstallation of Edge and Microsoft’s dark patterns that prevent users from downloading and effectively using rival browsers. These respondents ranged from independent browsers (like Browserworks, Mozilla, Vivaldi,and Wavebox) to non-governmental bodies like (Open Web Advocacy (“OWA”), and the Browser Choice Alliance (“BCA”), and consulting groups, i.e., Third Stage Consulting, highlighting the broad, cross-party support for intervention.
BCA members stated:
“Microsoft’s strategy of resetting browser defaults to Edge and ignoring user choice in key apps in its must-have productivity suite actively restricts business choice and creates a productivity drain for SMEs. When operating systems override the specialised tools, like Wavebox, that businesses deliberately choose and pay to use, they aren’t just pushing a browser, they are imposing a direct operational cost and lost time on small businesses trying to work efficiently.” (Wavebox)
“[Our] concern is straightforward: Microsoft leverages its longstanding dominance across Windows and Microsoft 365 to favour its own browser, Edge, limiting free and effective user choice and undermining fair browser competition.” (BrowserWorks)
“Microsoft is clearly deliberately trying to force users back to Edge, who then blame us and are less likely to keep using our browser for work and professional reasons. We are glad to see the CMA picking up on these issues, since we are not able to fight back against Microsoft’s massive market power in OS and productivity where Microsoft sets the rules of the game.” (Vivaldi)
Other market participants have echoed these concerns in their own submissions alongside the BCA:
Mozilla states that
“…during the upgrade from Windows 10 to Windows 11, users who have selected alternative default browsers do not have that choice maintained and respected. Instead, they are reset to use Edge as the default, with significant negative impact on usage and retention rates of alternative browsers.”
And furthermore,
“Microsoft has employed a number of coercive design practices in an attempt to steer users towards Microsoft products and away from alternatives. These design practices violate Microsoft’s own design guidelines, strongly suggesting that Microsoft is aware that these choices are not made with the user’s best interests in mind. Further, the fact that many of these deceptive practices disappear when used on recent versions of Microsoft’s software set to the EEA region show that they are not inherent to the design of the software but rather reflect deliberate design choices.”
And that
“Microsoft already uses harmful design practices to force users onto its own Edge browser, even where they have intentionally selected an alternative browser.”
Open Web Advocacy reports that
“The evidence set out in this report demonstrates a consistent pattern of behavior by Microsoft that undermines effective browser competition on Windows. These practices are not isolated design choices but form an interconnected system of friction, nudging, and technical restriction that steers users toward Microsoft Edge while making it more difficult to use competing browsers. Even where individual elements may appear minor in isolation, their cumulative effect is to raise switching costs, distort user choice, and expand Microsoft’s browser market share at the expense of rivals, consumers and businesses.”
In addition, Computer and Communications Industry Association observes that:
“The area where the presentation of choices and defaults has caused the most widespread concern is how Microsoft presents browser choices in Windows. Unlike in mobile ecosystems, with relatively simple factual reminders, these choices are often presented to appear like security updates. Presenting a commercial steer as if it were a security or system message is the kind of potentially misleading design where intervention might produce greater benefits.”
The BCA stands ready to assist the CMA in its investigation.
Subscribe to our monthly newsletter:
An update on everything that’s shaping the browser and digital competition landscape.
*Compulsory field