Commission asks for comments on Google settlement bid
Search engine offers to label search results more clearly in attempt to avoid fine.
The European Commission has invited Google’s rivals and other interested parties to comment on a settlement offer made by the US search engine aimed at avoiding it being fined for alleged breach of a dominant position.
Among proposals made by Google is a commitment to label promoted links to its own specialised search services such as Google Maps so that users can differentiate them from ordinary search results.
It also agreed to display links to three rival specialised search services in an area of its website near to links to its own services.
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Google also said that it would end exclusivity clauses in contracts with advertisers.
The Commission has been investigating concerns that Google abused a dominant position in Europe’s online search market since 2010.
Interested parties have one month to give the Commission their feedback. If the Commission concludes that Google’s offer addresses their competition concerns they could become legally binding for the next five years.
However, Google’s competitors and consumer groups suggested today that Google had not gone far enough to address competition concerns.
Shivaun Raff, the CEO of Foundem, a British search engine that complained to the Commission about Google, said that Google had fallen short of making the changes needed.
“Instead of promising to end its abusive practices, Google’s proposal seems to offer a half-hearted attempt to dilute their anti-competitive effects, by labelling Google’s own services and throwing in some token links to competitors’ services alongside them,” she said.
“Without robust guidelines that guarantee the placement, depth, prominence, and relevance of these links, and guarantee that the selection of competitors will be free from anti-competitive penalties and discrimination, neither measure will make a dent in Google’s ability to hijack the traffic and revenues of its rivals.”
Monique Goyens, the director-general of Beuc, the European consumer organisation, said that she was “disappointed”.
“Labelling results will do little or indeed nothing to prevent Google from manipulating search results and discriminating against competing services,” she said.
“It may even shepherd consumers towards clicking on Google services now highlighted in a frame.
“Labelling should not be the sole solution. Infringements of competition rules call for strong and rigorous structural remedies where needed, going beyond the halfway house of consumer information. Labelling an infringement of competition law doesn’t prevent it being an infringement.”