After months of debate, Europe on Wednesday unveiled its plans to create a digital single market, uniting industries and consumers online across all 28 EU countries.
The proposals, presented on Wednesday, will have a wide-ranging impact across the media and entertainment industry, from the film and television sectors to telecoms and mobile carriers to online providers of goods and services.
According to the EU's own figures, only 15 percent of EU citizens shop online in another EU country, and only 7 percent of small and medium sized companies in Europe sell their goods and services cross-border.
The stated goal of the "digital single market strategy" is to knock down national barriers between European countries by updating copyright laws, harmonizing regulation and scrapping barriers to online trade such as geo-blocking, the process by which businesses in one country restrict access to websites or content based in another.
Critics of the proposals say Europe is looking to create its own pan-national digital fortress, enacting laws that restrict or punish big tech companies, such as Google, Amazon and Facebook, to help Europe's fledging Internet industry compete.