EU teaches Google a lesson, fines a massive €1.5 billion for hurting rivals' business

European Union today announced that it’d imposed a hefty €1.5 billion antitrust fine on Google.

Google is accused of using its dominant position to eliminate its competitors. This time, however, it is not related to Google’s Play Store service.

According to the EU commission, Google forced its AdSense customers to sign a contract which in turn handcuffed the customers from doing business with rival search companies.

EU antitrust Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said, “The misconduct lasted over 10 years and denied other companies the possibility to compete on the merits and to innovate.”

Vestager also clarified that it’s not the of the story as the EU commission is keeping a close eye on Google’s other business model. “We keep getting complaints from people who are concerned about how these markets work, so we will keep doing our job,” said Vestager. “For me, the most important thing here is to enable user choice.”

Google and the EU have come face to face for the third time. Prior to this, the company was hit with a total of €6.7 billion(€2.4 billion in 2017 and then €4.34 billion last year).

Following the EU’s announcement, Google released a press statement in which Google’s SVP of global affairs, Kent Walker,  said, “We’ve always agreed that healthy, thriving markets are in everyone’s interest. We’ve already made a wide range of changes to our products to address the Commission’s concerns. Over the next few months, we’ll be making further updates to give more visibility to rivals in Europe.”

Via: The Verge