EU court finds geo-blocking of video gaming platform against competition law

By Beyza Binnur Donmez

GENEVA (AA) - The EU General Court said Wednesday that geo-blocking of the world's most prominent video gaming platform Steam is contradicting the bloc's competition law, rejecting owner company Valve group's appeal.

"The General Court confirms that geo-blocking of activation keys for the Steam platform infringed EU competition law," the court said in a statement.

Nothing that Steam and five PC video games publishers unlawfully restricted cross-border sales of certain PC video games, the court said it found that they "had participated in a group of anti-competitive agreements or concerted practices which were intended to restrict cross-border sales of certain PC video games that were compatible with the Steam platform, by putting in place territorial control functionalities during different periods between 2010 and 2015, in particular the Baltic countries and certain countries in central and Eastern Europe."

Valve filed a lawsuit with the Court to request an annulment of the relevant decision but in the judgment, the court rejected the lawsuit.

"That geo-blocking sought to prevent the video games, distributed in certain countries at low prices, from being purchased by distributors or users located in other countries where prices are much higher," it said.

It added that the geo-blocking in question did not aim to protect the copyright of PC video game publishers. Instead, it was utilized to eliminate the importation of those games and safeguard the publishers' significant royalty collections and Valve's profits.