The headline is clickbait.
Microsoft is saying why they couldn’t secure the kernel against such an attack, and are right in saying that the EU prevents them from closing it off to third parties.
They are not saying the EU is the root cause of the failure, just that they cannot close the hole currently due to the EU.
What they leave out is that they could choose to integrate Defender into the OS for free, thereby removing it as a product to compete against. They could also move Defender to not require kernel hooks either. Neither are options they want to consider currently.
Integrating Defender sounds like it would create an antitrust issue? If I remember correctly, MS was in the past taken to court and forced to sell some product or other separately, when they previously provided it for free.
No comment about being able to move Defender to not require kernel hooks (I don't know).
It’s unclear imho if it would be an antitrust behaviour. Many regions have security exceptions as long as it’s a core feature. It also wouldn’t prevent competitors working at a higher level either.
They are not saying the EU is the root cause of the failure, just that they cannot close the hole currently due to the EU.
What they leave out is that they could choose to integrate Defender into the OS for free, thereby removing it as a product to compete against. They could also move Defender to not require kernel hooks either. Neither are options they want to consider currently.