Vestager Gears Up for Tech Czar Role With Warning Over Data

Margrethe Vestager, the European Union’s new tech czar, warned that privacy watchdogs must have resources to match their beefed-up powers and issued a fresh antitrust threat to companies abusing their control of data to crush competition.

The Dane, who is due to start as the EU’s digital policy commissioner as soon as Dec. 1, warned that wide new privacy rights introduced last year have few teeth “if you cannot enforce them.”

Margrethe Vestager

Phtographer: Aris Oikonomou/AFP via Getty Images

Vestager’s comments come as Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner finalizes high-profile probes of Facebook Inc.’s WhatsApp and Twitter Inc. amid 21 investigations into some of the world’s ...