14 DAY TRIAL // The European Commission is preparing a formal complaint on Microsoft's failure to provide a browser choice screen to its European Windows users.
A report issued by Bloomberg and citing two people close to the matter reveals that antitrust regulators are willing to continue their investigations despite Microsoft's efforts to update all Windows workstations with a web-browser choice screen.
Back in July, the European Commission revealed that it had received several complaints that Microsoft doesn't allow its users to choose their browser after installing the Windows operating system and Internet Explorer was automatically configured as the default app to handle web browsing.
Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, quickly issued a dedicated fix delivered via Windows Update, providing users with more browser options.
“Due to a technical error, we missed delivering the BCS software to PCs that came with the service pack 1 update to Windows 7. The BCS software has been delivered as it should have been to PCs running the original version of Windows 7, as well as the relevant versions of Windows XP and Windows Vista,” Microsoft said in a press release back in July.
“We understand that the Commission may decide to impose other sanctions,” the company admitted in the same release.
The so-called BCS (which stands for Browser Choice Screen) is an application available via Windows Update that checks to see if Internet Explorer is currently configured as the default browser on a specific computer. If it is, BCS gives users other browser options beside Internet Explorer.
Windows 8 was also updated with the same browser choice screen, even if the operating system will officially be launched on October 25.
Microsoft hasn't yet released a comment on the matter, but more details are very likely to be released soon.