French Competition Watchdog Fined Google For Abusing Dominance
Google didn’t challenge the findings and accepted the operational changes including improved interoperability
The competition regulator of France fined American technology company Google for abusing its dominance in the online advertisement market.
France’s competition watchdog fined Google for unfairly sending business to its own services and the penalty of $268 million is part of a settlement after three media groups accused the company of practicing Monopoly.
The authority’s president Isabelle de Silva said that the ruling was the first in the world to scrutinize the complex algorithmic processes for the auctions.
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“This sanction and these commitments will make it possible to re-establish a level playing field for all actors, and the ability of publishers to make the most of their advertising spaces”, she added.
As per details, the French watchdog began looking into Google’s ad tech business after several complaints were made from various French publishers.
The companies that filed the complaints were News Corp Inc, the Le Figaro, and the Rossel La Voix group.
As per the details released by the authority, the investigations were caried out quickly and revealed that Google was relying on its dominant position on ad servers and was favored over its competitors.
The competitor regulator also found out that the company’s preferential treatment also harmed its competitors and publishers.
On the other hand, Google didn’t challenge the findings and accepted the operational changes including improved interoperability.
Maria Gomri, Legal Director at Google France, maintained that the company is going to test and develop the suggested changes in the coming months before deploying them more broadly.
Earlier in 2019, Google was fined 150 million euros by the French regulator over “opaque’ operating rules for its ad platform.
Last week, Germany’s competition regulator announced to expand an antitrust investigation into Google and its parent company Alphabet to include Google News Showcase, a service aimed at increasing revenue for media publishers, reported France 24.
