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Commission Press Release
The European Commission has decided to open an antitrust investigation into allegations that Google Inc. has abused a dominant position in online search, in violation of European Union rules (Article 102 TFEU). The opening of formal proceedings follows complaints by search service providers about unfavourable treatment of their services in Google's unpaid and sponsored search results coupled with an alleged preferential placement of Google's own services. This initiation of proceedings does not imply that the Commission has proof of any infringements.
At Google, we’ve always focused on putting the user first by providing the best possible answers as quickly as possible - and our product innovation and engineering talent have delivered results that users seem to like, in a world where the competition is only one click away. However, given our success and the disruptive nature of our business, it’s entirely understandable that we’ve caused unease among other companies and caught the attention of regulators. Today, the European Commission has announced that they will continue to review complaints about Google's search and search advertising.
Google's thought
Google Faces A Serious And Multi-Pronged EC Competition Probe
Google (NSDQ: GOOG) is about to get its most significant scrutiny yet by the European Commission, whose antitrust department is opening a formal investigation in to claims that it abuses its search dominance. that it “ imposes exclusivity obligations on advertising partners , preventing them from placing certain types of competing ads on their web sites, as well as on computer and software vendors, with the aim of shutting out competing search tools” “suspected restrictions on the portability of online advertising campaign data to competing online advertising platforms”Focuses On Niche EU Competitors
The European Commission has launched an investigation into Google after three vertical search engines submitted formal complaints that the firm had use its dominant position to crowd out and disappear results from these engines – as reports various outlets including Bloomberg and the BBC . The EU is obliged to look into whether Google has purposely lowered the search rankings of price comparison sites Foundem (UK) and Ciao (owned by the Microsoft’s Bing), and French legal search engine ejustice.fr in its results. The EU investigatation will also take in Google’s ad platform, which covers Google’s unpaid and sponsored search results and “an alleged preferential placement of Google’s own services.” We’re going to take a look at what all this means.
Dark forces gunning for Google
Last week's announcement that Google is to be investigated by the EU for allegedly giving preference to its own services and advertisers in search rankings - something Google categorically denies - will come as no surprise to those watching the search giant's behaviour over the past few years. But a key player in all of this that you might not have heard of is the Brussels-based "Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace", or ICOMP, which has been lobbying for an antitrust investigation. ICOMP is a organisation whose sole purpose appears to be to attack Google: it was set up to protest against Google's DoubleClick acquisition and has spent the last few years churning out blog posts slamming the search giant and approaching journalists out of the blue with carefully primed stories. Why does this matter? Because ICOMP is almost entirely funded - and not always wholly transparently - by Microsoft, one of Google's main competitors in search.Rivals Say Google Plays Favorites
Google Inc. GOOG +1.35% increasingly is promoting some of its own content over that of rival websites when users perform an online search, prompting competing sites to cry foul. The Internet giant is displaying links to its own services—such as local-business information or its Google Health service—above the links to other, non-Google content found by its search engine. Google increasingly is promoting some of its own content over that of rival websites when users perform an online search, prompting competing sites to cry foul.
Google answers WSJ
Posted by Carter Maslan, Director of Product Management This Sunday the Wall Street Journal published a story about local search that makes a number of assertions about how local search works at Google, so we thought it would be helpful to share our view on these issues. When people come to Google looking for information about places like restaurants, shoe stores, parks or museums, our goal is to provide them with answers as quickly as possible and presented in a way that’s easy to read and understand. Sometimes the most useful information is a direct link to a business—other times it’s a map or a list of review sites.
Google decides that Google services are best
The more I read about the way that Google is giving prominence to its own information and shopping results in search queries, the more I think the European Union is correct to investigate. Several of Google’s rivals in travel, shopping and health information, have been complaining to regulators that the world’s biggest search engine directs users to its own services rather than theirs. This is one of the issues the EU is investigating and it fits with the complaint Barry Diller expressed to the FT in July that Google was giving arbitrary prominence to its own travel service results, rather than those of Expedia, InterActive Corp and others: As he put it then : “I think it is disturbing that Google is moving into serving individual spaces, rather than being search neutral. It is a dangerous step because it is inevitably going to cause problems with customers and regulatory authorities.”
Over the weekend, the Wall Street Journal ran an article pointing out how Google is increasingly favoring its own properties, in search results over natural results to outside sites which previously commanded the top spots. This practice is especially noticeable with Google Places and local results, but there are other examples as well from product and mortgage search to health search. We’ve seen these spats before, particularly between Google and Yelp . Citysearch and Tripadvisor are also taking a traffic hit, it seems. Google responded yesterday with a post on its public policy blog titled “Local Search: It’s all about the best answers for users.”
Google, These Aren’t Really The Best Answers For Users. They Are The Best Answers For You
Guess Who Just Gatecrashed Google’s Antitrust Case
Image via CrunchBase Things were going so smoothly for Google . The search giant was months away from reaching a settlement with the European Competition Commission, after a coterie of tiny Internet firms complained it was unfairly indexing search results to favor its products. Talks between its lawyers at Cleary Gottlieb and the regulators were going well, Google was being flexible , and it almost looked like it would avoid paying a fine . Of course, someone had to crash this party. Microsoft announced this morning that it was filing its own antitrust complaint against Google to the European Competition Commission.
Google said that it is being investigated by the Department of Justice and has set aside $500 million from its first quarter income for a potential settlement of the case. The probe is looking at alleged monopolistic practices in Google’s advertising program. The information was disclosed in a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission . Few details were disclosed about the investigation.
Google could pay $500M to settle antitrust probe into ads
French Competition Authority
L'Autorité de la concurrence estime que Google est en position dominante sur le marché de la publicité liée aux moteurs de recherche. Elle estime que le droit de la concurrence peut mettre des bornes aux agissements de Google et répondre aux enjeux concurrentiels soulignés par les acteurs sans qu'il soit nécessaire de mettre en place une régulation d'ensemble du secteur. Elle propose des réponses ciblées aux préoccupations identifiées. > English version L'Autorité de la concurrence a été saisie pour avis en février 2010 par le ministre de l'Economie, des Finances et de l'Emploi, au sujet du fonctionnement de la concurrence dans le secteur de la publicité en ligne, en application de l'article L. 462-1 du code de commerce.French authorities have finally got some kind of ruling against Google ( NSDQ: GOOG ) - but it turns out to be rather toothless. The competition watchdog, L’Autorité de la Concurrence, in an opinion expressed to the finance minister, says Google is “dominant” in search advertising (no surprise there - Google’s search share in Europe is far higher than in the U.S.). But it did not rule Google that is abusing that dominance, instead saying: “ This dominance is, of course, not wrong in itself : it is the result of a tremendous effort of innovation, backed by significant and ongoing investment.
France Says Google Is Main Cause Of News Publishers’ Woes
Google is in discussions with the European Union in a bid to settle an anti-trust investigation into its market-leading search engine, according to reports. Reuters reported on Monday that Google is in "tentative talks" to resolve the matter, in an attempt to avoid a lengthy legal battle and potentially large fine. However, a source familiar with the case told the news service that there are "no really concrete proposals on the table". The EU opened its investigation into Google after accusations that the search firm lowered the unpaid rankings of its competitors' services and promoted its own services in their place.