Somewhere in Cork, Ireland.
The hum of the climate control was the only sound in Isla's glass-walled office. It was 8: PM. On her panoramic screen, a document was displayed that made her blood run cold.
It was a leaked early draft of the European Union’s “Fair Digital Markets Act” (FDMA). On the surface, it was a dry, legalistic text about market dominance and developer fees. But Isla, with her decade of experience navigating the razor’s edge between innovation and ethics, saw the ghost in the machine.
Her intercom buzzed, shattering the silence. “Isla? He’s on his way up.” It was her assistant, voice tight with anxiety.
A moment later, the door slid open and Lars, the hard-nosed General Counsel, strode in. His tie was loosened, and he carried a tablet like a shield.
“You’ve seen it,” he said, not a question.
“I’ve seen the pretext,” Isla replied, her voice calm despite the knot in her stomach. She gestured to the screen. “They’re not just coming for our revenue, Lars. They’re coming for our architecture.”
Lars dropped into the chair opposite her. “The legal team’s initial assessment is a nightmare. Their arguments about the 30% ‘tax’ are populist gold. We’ll be painted as monopolistic villains before we can even say ‘security’.”
“That’s the point!” Isla leaned forward, her fingers steepled. “Don’t you see the elegance of it? They’re using our own business model as the crowbar to pry open our devices. They scream about our 30% cut, while quietly planning to take 70% of everyone’s money and 100% of their privacy.”
She pulled up another file on a secondary screen—a technical brief from the EU’s digital services agency about a “Unified Citizen ID & CBDC Platform.” It mentioned mandatory integration at the OS level.
“They’ll force us to allow alternative app stores with the FDMA,” Isla explained, her tone that of a pathologist outlining a disease. “And the first one through the door will be their own: the ‘EU Open Store.’ A state-run store. And what will be its flagship, mandatory app? ‘EU Digital Identity Wallet.’ An app that would never, ever pass our review. It requires root-level access we’d never grant. Camera. Microphone. They can remotely turn it on anytime. Low-level features to block access to airports, trains, bank accounts with a bogus carbon footprint counter. It’s an Orwellian spyware suite, Lars.”
Lars massaged his temples. “Our public line has to be about security. Sideloading exposes our users to malware. Fragmentation degrades the user experience.”
“And they’ll call it fear-mongering,” Isla shot back. “They’ll say we’re just protecting our turf. We need to fight this on a different battlefield. We have to reveal their true goal.”
“And how do we do that without looking like we’re lashing out at our regulators? Without confirming every negative stereotype about us?” Lars challenged. “If we accuse the European Union of building a surveillance state, we’ll be booted out of the single market by lunchtime.”
Isla stood and walked to the window, looking down at the glittering city—a city in a union she once believed in. She thought of her father, who had grown up under a dictatorship. He’d taught her that the most dangerous walls were never the visible ones.
“We’re not just a company in this fight, Lars,” she said softly. “We’re a gatekeeper, yes. But we’re a gatekeeper that protects our users from things like this. The EU isn’t trying to break down the gate to let people out. They’re trying to break it down to let themselves in.”
She turned to face him, her expression resolute.
“They want to make this about their 30%. We have to make it about their 100%. We have to find a way to show the public that the European Union isn’t saving them from a ‘tax’—it’s preparing to charge a far higher price. Their freedom.”
The two executives sat in silence, the weight of the impending conflict settling over them. The battle for the soul of the European Union would not be fought in parliament first, or in the courts. It would be fought here, in rooms like this, by people like Isla, who understood that the code that protected a device was now the last line of defense for the citizen.
The question was, did she have the time to convince the world before the walls came up?
