There's no two without three. The European Antitrust has decided to impose a 1,49 billion euro fine to Google for violation of the competition rules. It is the third fine in two years after the 2,4 billion euro imposed in 2017 for comparison and shopping services, but above all after the 4,34 billion euro fine - a real record - received by Big G in 2018 due to Android OS.
This time, however, the Mountain View company has decided to run for cover and to avoid making the number one of the EU antitrust, Margrethe Vestager, "angry again", announces a series of changes that will arrive in the coming months.
The third @Google case: @Google is fined €1,49bn for illegal practices in search advertising brokering to cement its dominant market position. They shouldn't do that – it denied consumers choice, innovative products and fair prices.
- Margrethe Vestager (@vestager) 20 March 2019
But what did Google do this time? According to the Community body, the company allegedly abused its dominant position through AdSense, a platform for online advertising intermediation, by imposing restrictive clauses in contracts with third-party websites, which sometimes even reached the point of exclusivity. The aim was to prevent its competitors from placing their advertisements on these sites.
“The misconduct lasted ten years and prevented other companies from competing on the merits and innovating,” said Commissioner Vestager.
Kent Walker, vice president of Global Affairs at Google, commented: “We've always agreed that healthy, thriving markets are in everyone's best interest. We have already introduced a number of changes to our products to address the Commission's concerns; in the coming months, we will introduce further updates to increase the visibility of our competitors in Europe”.
