Google VP of Security Engineering Heather Adkins warns the EU's DMA proposals to open Android and Search could lead to a significant rise in fraud within weeks
Europe's pro-competition proposals could see Google Search and Android systems opened up. The company claims there are serious privacy flaws.
Context & Ripple Effects
The EU’s April DMA proposals focused on opening Android to rival AI services, extending an enforcement arc that had already included scrutiny of Google Search’s treatment of rivals and app-developer restrictions.
Google had previously argued that further EU changes to Search and the Play Store could create malware, fraud, and traffic risks. The later DMA decisions ordering comparable access to Android and certain Search data show that the access question moved beyond draft proposals.
First-order effects
- Google is formally positioning fraud and privacy risk as a central objection to the proposed Android and Search access requirements, raising the importance of implementation safeguards in its dealings with EU regulators.
- Rival AI assistants and search engines stand to gain a clearer route to comparable access if the DMA measures are implemented; Google’s warning does not itself establish that fraud will rise.
Second-order effects
- The debate shifts from whether third parties should receive access toward the controls around identity, data handling, app integration, and abuse prevention that would govern that access.
- Google’s rivals may need to demonstrate security and privacy practices robust enough to support the EU’s interoperability goals, while regulators face pressure to distinguish legitimate safeguards from barriers to competition.
Third-order effects
- If comparable-access mandates become routine, platform competition policy will increasingly depend on technical governance rules—APIs, permissions, verification, and auditability—rather than on high-level access obligations alone.
- The unresolved tension is whether security requirements can be standardized without allowing dominant platforms to use risk claims to preserve control over key distribution and discovery points.
The trend: This is part of a broader DMA shift from policing platform conduct after the fact toward requiring interoperable access to the operating-system and search layers where AI competition is emerging.