'On the basis of an internal questionnaire sent to our members, this report presents the views of the European Publishers Council (“EPC”) on the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) and its effects on news publishers and the wider online community. Its purpose is to inform the European Commission of the unintended consequences of the GDPR on news publishers, and on the online advertising eco-system on which they critically depend as a source of revenue. While the GDPR has provided important benefits to society at large in terms of increased privacy, it has also strengthened the dominant position of large platforms in online advertising markets, such as Google and Facebook, to the detriment of their smaller rivals and news publishers. This increased market concentration harms news publishers in terms of choice, innovation and revenues and arguably undermines the benefits of GDPR for the users of large platforms. For these reasons, the current situation is in our view unsustainable so part of our paper includes some recommendations for the future.'
