Global efforts to crimp the power of the world’s largest technology companies scored an important legal victory on Wednesday when an EU court gave its blessing to a record multibillion-dollar fine issued against Google in 2018.
The decision, by the General Court in Luxembourg, provides fresh momentum to European regulators who have investigated companies like Google, Amazon and Apple for anti-competitive business practices.
The fine of €4.34 billion (worth $5.1 billion in 2018) was the largest ever handed out by a European competition authority. The court on Wednesday agreed that Google broke antitrust laws by using its Android smartphone technology and its dominance in that market to cement the leadership of its search engine.
A legal defeat would have bruised the EU’s reputation as one of the world’s most aggressive regulators of the tech industry just as the bloc has promised to clamp down even further on Big Tech. Antitrust regulators in Brussels, led by Margrethe Vestager, the European Commission executive vice-president in charge of digital and competition policy, have other investigations underway against Amazon, Apple, Google and Meta.
And this year, EU policymakers passed new laws related to competition and internet content moderation that give regulators even more power to target the tech industry. “We are disappointed that the court did not annul the decision in full,” Google said in a statement.
“Android has created more choice for everyone, not less, and supports thousands of successful businesses in Europe and around the world.” The company has previously argued that free and open-source Android has resulted in low-cost phones and driven competition with itschief rival, Apple. Android isthe most popular mobile operating system.
The fine is one of three antitrust penalties totalling more than $8 billion that the European Commission slapped on Google between 2017 and2019, putting the 27-nation bloc at the forefront of the global push to rein in tech giants. Since then, the commission has widened its crackdown on digital giants with more antitrust investigations targeting Amazon, Apple and Facebook and sweeping new rules aimed at clamping down on the biggest digital companies.
Tech companies are now facing tighter scrutiny around the world: Google also got hit with a $50 million fine on Wednesday by South Korean privacy watchdogs that also fined Facebook parent Meta$22 million. The Android case remains one of the world’s most aggressive regulatory actions ever taken against a tech company. In the 2018 decision, Google was found to have illegally used Android to secure the dominance of its search engine. Regulators said the company struck deals that required smartphone makers such as Samsung and Huawei that rely on Android to make Google the default search engine. Google now offers European users of Android devicesa screen to choose from different search engines.
(New York Times News Service and AP/PTI)
