Brussels boarding Mountain View. L'European Union wants to sue Google for abuse of dominant position in the search engine sector, thus starting a game which – according to the Wall Street Journal – could end with a over six billion dollars in fines and a series of injunctions.
The EU commissioner of the Antitrust, Margrethe Vestager, intends to present an appeal against the Californian giant for violation of some rules on competition. The indiscretion was confirmed yesterday evening by the European responsible for the digital agenda, the German Oettinger. The final decision is expected today.
Google, on whose search engine 90% of online searches are made in Europe, is in the European sights because – according to the Community Antitrust – it has used content from competing companies by passing them off as their own and has privileged its services in the responses offered to users on travel, online commerce and maps, thereby harming competition.
The investigations lasted five years, during which unsuccessful negotiations were conducted with the American group. There were three attempts at conciliation. But then the plaintiffs prevailed, including the German virtual community Ciao, the British Foudem and the companies united in the Open Internet Project (which includes, among other things, the global publisher Springer).
From the start of the procedure - which takes place with a "letter of objections" - Google would have 10 weeks to defend itself against the allegations and would risk a fine of up to 10% of global turnover.
Oettinger, during a conference, denounced the "dependence" of European online companies on a few international giants, underlining that Europe "has lost opportunities" to develop its own platforms, but that now we need to "replace today's search engines, operating systems and social networks".
