EU Slams Google with €460M Fine for Favoring Own Services

The European Commission has issued a non-compliance decision against Alphabet, Google's parent company, citing nine services that are ranked more favorably than comparable third-party offerings on Google Search.

The decision, which carries a penalty of €460 million, identifies six transactional services and three content services as being in violation of the Digital Markets Act (DMA). The affected services include Google Maps, Google Shopping, and Google's sports information service, among others.

The Commission's reasoning focuses on the fact that these services are not simply online search engines, but rather distinct or additional services that diverge from the purpose of searching all websites. For example, Google Maps is treated as an online intermediation service in its own right, while Google Shopping is considered a comparison shopping service.

The decision also rejects Alphabet's argument that similarity between services should be assessed based on substitutability for users, instead opting for a broader definition of similarity based on tasks and functionalities. The Commission concludes that Alphabet treats its own services more favorably in ranking and related indexing and crawling, violating Article 6(5) of the DMA.