3 criteria (activities, sectors of relevance, actors, level of control, etc.) These criteria are of the utmost importance for determination of the applicable law (B2B or B2C transaction, sectoral legislation) and the liability of platform. According to activities we differentiate among: web hosting providers,9search engines,10 online media sharing providers,11 social media, networking and discussion forums, allowing users to connect and communicate publicly or semi-publicly or messaging platforms, allowing users to communicate and share content privately; matchmaking and e-commerce platforms, facilitating the transaction of services, marketplaces, app stores; within this group, a narrower category may be identified, namely: collaborative platforms, offering non-professional actors to offer offlineservices on an occasional basis (e.g. short term let of one apartment); and the other matchmaking platforms, such as dating apps;12 The present EU law has already reflected the existence of the on-line platforms. Modernisation of Unfair Commercial Practices Directive has been processed by the Directive 2019/2161 known broadly as the Omnibus Directive or “Enforcement and Modernization Directive”. It came into effect on 7 January 2020 and introduced the term ‘online marketplace’ that means a service using software, including a website, part of a website or an application, operated by or on behalf of a trader which allows consumers to conclude distance contracts with other traders or consumers. Furthermore, Regulation 2019/1150 on promoting fairness and transparency for business users of online intermediation services is specially targeted to this area and it has introduced set of rules governing principles for relations between providers of online intermediation services and online search engines and business users and corporate website users that offer goods or services to consumers through these channels. Platforms operating in the tourism market and their services For our purposes are most relevant platforms connected with provision and intermediation of travel services. If we borrow the definition of ‚travel service’ from the Package Travel Directive 2015, most prominent services in tourism are • carriage of passengers. • accommodation. • rental of cars, other motor vehicles or motorcycles • and ‘other services’ as admission to concerts, sport events, excursions or event parks, guided tours, ski passes and rental of sports equipment such as skiing equipment, or spa treatments. Platforms operating in the tourism market may have a different nature in terms of the activities and level of control, e.g., interference or influence on the actual provision of the service by a third party. The operator of the platform can participate in the market 9 Allowing users to host a website or other internet-based offering. 10Allowing users to carry out systematic web searches for particular information, specified in a textual web search query, indexing results accordingly. 11 Allowing publication and consumption of online content and which, according to the type of material shared, can be further distinguished in news aggregation and broadcasting, music streaming, video streaming, blogs, etc. 12 Bertolini, Episcopo, Cherciu, 2021, p. 4.
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