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On 14 February 2020, the Italian Communications Authority (Agcom) came to a decision regarding a proceeding initiated against Rai for its alleged failure to fulfill the general radio and television public service obligations and the National Service Contract - 2018-2022. This proceeding was initiated on 23 July 2019, pursuant to Article 48, paragraph 2 of the Consolidated Act on Audiovisual Media Services, recognising in the public service broadcaster's programming potential violations of the "principles of balance, pluralism, completeness, objectivity, impartiality, independence and...

On 5 March 2020, the Regional Administrative Tribunal of Lazio (TAR Lazio) annulled a decision by which, on 20 May 2019, the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) imposed measures on Sky Italian Holding SpA (Sky) to remove the anti-competitive effects created by its partially abandoned acquisition of the technical platform R2 Srl (R2) from Mediaset Premium S.p.A (MP) (Transaction). R2 provides technical platform services enabling broadcasters to retail a pay-TV offer on DTT. Sky filed the Transaction with the ICA on 28 November 2018, and the ICA opened a Phase II investigation in March 2019. The...

On 17 January 2020, the Italian Council of Ministers approved a draft bill specifically prohibiting ambush marketing which was introduced following a proposal by the Minister of Justice, Alfonso Bonafede. The bill aims at strengthening the protection of the economic interests of companies that sponsor sports events and exhibitions of national and international relevance. The bill should introduce appropriate measures, particularly in light of the upcoming 2020 UEFA European Football Championship, with a view to preventing unauthorised economic players from associating their trademarks or products...

On 12 December 2019, the Economic and Statistical Division (Servizio Economico Statistico) of the Italian Communications Authority released the Observatory on Digital Platforms for 2019. The document provides a comprehensive overview of the value of the digital market and of the main actors operating within it. It shows the rising role of digital platforms which hold seven out of the ten top seats of the world ranking (Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Alibaba, Tencent). The research consists of four sections, devoted respectively to: general information; markets and services;...

On 11 December 2019, Judge Stefania Garrisi issued an interim order on behalf of the Rome Commercial Court enjoining the social media company Facebook Ireland Ltd to reactivate the account of the extreme right-wing movement “CasaPound Italia” and that of its administrator, Davide Di Stefano. On 9 September 2019, Facebook had closed CasaPound Italia’s account, with some 240 000 followers, as well as the accounts of some of its members and sympathisers, due to an alleged infringement of Facebook’s policy prohibiting the incitement to hatred and violence. The next day,...