C. Scott Brown / Android Authority
Tl;
- EU regulators want to see Google Search Stop prioritizing Google Services rather than those offered by third parties.
- Last fall, Google tested to remove rich hotel booking options from search, but soon left that effort.
- Now the EU may be formally burdening Google for violating digital markets ACT Anti-competition rules.
Google’s pretty much always faces legal or regulatory obstacles from a place, and over the years we have seen the company Bob and weave through an attack of challenges. Recently, however, it has been confronted with what may be the most formidable opponent to date, in the form of the EUS Digital markets Act (DMA). With strict rules in place to ensure healthy competition, and means to enforce consequences that actually have some teeth, DMA has hung over Google’s European operations such as the Damocles sword since it came into force last spring. And now a new report suggests that Google may finally be about it falling.
The EU has seen the eyes of Google’s business for many reasons, but one of the surveys we have heard most about the Google search and the extent to which it can favor Google’s own solutions for tasks such as booking flights or doing hotel reservations, over those offered by Third -party websites. Last fall we saw Google Sending It Search results in the EU Back to the Stone Age, they release their own hotel booking tools and just present users a simple list of links.
This was a test to see what DMA -Samsenses can look like, and as Google Shared a few weeks later, the company didn’t like it. According to Google, users were unsatisfied with the experience, third -party websites did not get more clicks than before, and finally fewer hotel reservations were done. Then Google stopped the test.
Well, apparently it is not the kind of outcome the EU Commission likes to see, as Reuters Now reports that Google will soon be charged with violations of DMA’s rules to ensure fair competition. We cannot yet say exactly what outcome such costs can lead to, but the company is conceivable to meet fines that account for 10% of the turnover – and it is from around the world, not just in the EU. It may still take a few more months for these charges to be posted, but several sources indicate that they are on their way.
With the interests of so many parties that are beating heads now, from users, to regulators, to the technology company’s players themselves, it is constantly unclear what a mutually comfortable result can look like. Neither users nor regulators seem satisfied with the recurrent backup solution Google tried, and it doesn’t seem like the competition was really improved. Maybe lighting a very expensive candle under Google’s feet will be just what it eventually takes to come anywhere here.
