EU Fines Google $1 Billion For Breaking Digital Antitrust Regulations (apnews.com) 65
The European Union fined Google more than $1 billion for allegedly using Google Play and Search to steer users toward its own services and apps at the expense of competitors. The Associated Press reports: Google had recently lost its appeal of a $4.5 billion antitrust fine imposed by the EU for throttling competition and reducing consumer choice through the dominance of its mobile Android operating system. The European Commission, the bloc's executive branch and highest antitrust enforcer, said it was acting in the interest of consumers after an investigation of Google.
"The best products should succeed because they're better, not because they're owned by the company running the search engine. And European consumers have a right to be told by app developers where to sign up to the best offers, even when the app store owner does not get a cut," said Teresa Ribera, the commission's Executive Vice President for Clean, Just and Competitive Transition.
Google's President of Global Affairs Kent Walker blasted the fine as "product degradation driven by a small group of self-serving complainants" that will have a negative impact on European businesses and consumers. He said that the EU's Digital Markets Act forces Google "to strip away real-time search features Europeans love -- like instant pricing and direct availability for hotels, flights, and restaurants -- and dismantle safety protections on Google Play."
"The best products should succeed because they're better, not because they're owned by the company running the search engine. And European consumers have a right to be told by app developers where to sign up to the best offers, even when the app store owner does not get a cut," said Teresa Ribera, the commission's Executive Vice President for Clean, Just and Competitive Transition.
Google's President of Global Affairs Kent Walker blasted the fine as "product degradation driven by a small group of self-serving complainants" that will have a negative impact on European businesses and consumers. He said that the EU's Digital Markets Act forces Google "to strip away real-time search features Europeans love -- like instant pricing and direct availability for hotels, flights, and restaurants -- and dismantle safety protections on Google Play."
Have to wonder (Score:5, Insightful)
I know that the EU has been gunning for American big tech for a while now. But I get the feeling that there may be a little more fervor in that effort since Trump took office, both because the US is now a demonstrated menace to half the planet, and because big tech has just gotten that much more rapacious since the Orange One took office.
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Re: Have to wonder (Score:5, Insightful)
Random Slashdoter: "how dare they!"
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Well technically none of the EU related benefits have really been seen outside the EU. Tech companies do geofence compliance. That is both good and bad. On the one side you don't really benefit from e.g. changes in App store rules in the USA without winning an American court case, but on the other at least you're not getting cookie popups.
Hilarious (Score:5, Insightful)
I assume you think the US should also tariff up against Israel for failing to import more pork?
As a practical matter, more tariffs will chase EU customers off faster while punishing American companies. That's just giving them more object lessons in why the US is a dangerously unreliable partner while making sure business owners get their noses rubbed in it - a sure-fire way to convince an influential block of otherwise fairly small-c conservative voters the EU is doing the right thing.
It amazes me how many people seem to not understand very basic things about how people work. Inch-deep mile-wide grievance is a hell of a drug.
(And let's not even get in to however the fuck you think "recoup[ing] the funds" via tariffs would work. After Americans are taxed more on EU products, you think Google is going to get that money? How? What's the legal mechanism? And what does any of that have to do with an EU fine?)
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Uh, that's not how tariffs work. Tariffs are paid by importers. The reduced imports would hurt the EU exporters, but the taxes would be paid by Americans.
Re: Have to wonder (Score:2)
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And even if the American buys an American competitor's products to avoid the tariff, the American producers and sellers have room to raise their prices to match the higher foreign prices.
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America's appetite for ... corruption has been seemingly unbound long before Trump
Not even close and never at the presidential level. It's one thing to overthrow a foreign government at the behest of the National Fruit Company, but something entirely different to personally accept $400M gifts from foreign powers, to use the power of office to manipulate markets to personal advantage - let alone continuing to play them - or to set up a digital currency exchange that facilitates anonymous bribes. This term is unique in so many ways.
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"TDS" is what you blame when you don't want to address the actual content.
Re: Have to wonder (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: Have to wonder (Score:1)
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TDS... I understand that the asshole who came up with that acronym and definition was arrested for either child porn or going after a child for sex.
So, let's talk about your TDS, Trump Denial Syndrome.
Re:Have to wonder (Score:4, Funny)
No, you're just shocked that a government can enforce laws against mega corps.
Re: Have to wonder (Score:4, Informative)
Are you trying to sound like geekmux or did you forget not to?
Re:Have to wonder (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Have to wonder (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not that gunning yet. That may also happen in response to the tariffs but would be far larger and far more comprehensive.
Basically when unfair trade barriers (like a tariff) hit, you can reciprocate with measures for a similar amount. Given that the US doesn't make much, that would likely have to hit tech companies. So far the EU has had remarkable restraint on that, but as more illegal tariffs are added by the US get added that could happen at any time. Then your theory will hold up.
But this is not that. This is just Google ignoring laws that were pretty clear and being told to comply. Fines are designed to speed up compliance so if they are too low and you need to go through courts to get coercive sanctions. Better to start with something credible from the start.
Not unexpected. (Score:5, Insightful)
So Google's mouthpiece responds with Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD) as a matter of course because that's what they always do. Google is just one great example of why The European Union needs to worry about it's own digital sovereignty. Too bad a billion-dollar fine won't make much difference in their "Be Evil" product strategy. Late-stage capitalism at its finest, where "growth at any cost" is not just the ethos or logos of a cancer cell. Go Euro Commission. American companies pretty much suck at this point and they're not afraid to act up, even internationally. You do what you gotta do.
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Vote with your wallet: Do not buy products and services from evil American tech companies. I am sure China will sell you the same products and services instead. Or loosen regulations and maybe Europe can develop a functional tech economy of its own.
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I'm doing my best. Not in Europe (Canada, actually) but I cancelled Amazon, Facebook, Instagram, Netflix 18 months ago. Self-host email and calendar, so don't pay Google anything. I still watch videos on YouTube, but I never see any ads (I have very effective ad-blocking.)
Oh, Europe is being spurred to do that.
"dismantle safety protections on Google Play" (Score:4, Interesting)
aka Google-speak for "they haven't installed non-Play or sideloaded apps on their device."
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aka Google-speak for "they haven't installed non-Play or sideloaded apps on their device."
No... I'm pretty sure it's not that. Android does protect against malicious non-Play and sideloaded apps, and Google doesn't have a problem with those being installed. (Context: From 2014 until late last year I worked on the Android security team. I have pretty good knowledge of what they do and don't care about.)
I'd like to understand exactly what this part of the Google response is talking about. Maybe it's just throwaway FUD, not referring to anything in particular, but it could also be something
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Android does protect against malicious non-Play and sideloaded apps, and Google doesn't have a problem with those being installed.
I didn't write that very clearly. Google doesn't have a problem with non-Play and sideloaded apps being installed in general. They do have a problem with malicious apps, regardless of source.
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Google doesn't have a problem with non-Play and sideloaded apps being installed in general. They do have a problem with malicious apps, regardless of source.
And yet, their method for addressing that issue 1) doesn't prevent the installation of malicious apps, it only delays it, and 2) gets in the way of the user installing non-malicious apps from sources other than Google. Therefore Google is broadly incompetent and/or malicious since this thing they've done only harms the user.
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Google doesn't have a problem with non-Play and sideloaded apps being installed in general. They do have a problem with malicious apps, regardless of source.
And yet, their method for addressing that issue 1) doesn't prevent the installation of malicious apps, it only delays it, and 2) gets in the way of the user installing non-malicious apps from sources other than Google. Therefore Google is broadly incompetent and/or malicious since this thing they've done only harms the user.
If you have a strategy that would work better, by all means go talk to the Android security team about it. They'd be happy to pay you a lot of money, if your ideas are good, and feasible. Honestly, that's very unlikely; a large number of very smart people have been thinking hard about this since about 2013, but maybe you can see something no one else has.
The strategy has a few parts:
1. Scan the the Play store apps for malicious code using both static and dynamic analysis. This will never catch everyt
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If you have a strategy that would work better
Not shitting on users would work better for making them not pissed off at your bullshit. Specifically, giving users a way around the 24 hour delay not-your-phone-google's-phone fuckery.
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If you have a strategy that would work better
Not shitting on users would work better for making them not pissed off at your bullshit. Specifically, giving users a way around the 24 hour delay not-your-phone-google's-phone fuckery.
Could you elaborate? What 24 hour delay?
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Could you elaborate? What 24 hour delay?
Could you elaborate on exactly what you did at Google since you apparently have no idea what they are doing Re: sideloading and the security you claim they need to protect users from what google doesn't want them to do?
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Could you elaborate? What 24 hour delay?
Could you elaborate on exactly what you did at Google since you apparently have no idea what they are doing Re: sideloading and the security you claim they need to protect users from what google doesn't want them to do?
I was the TL for hardware-backed cryptography and associated bits. No, I didn't always follow every detail of what others on the large (hundreds of engineers by the time I left, though I was #13 on the team when I joined in 2014) team was doing. However, I do quite fully understand the context in which they were doing it. If you'd actually like to understand more about the thinking that likely underlay whatever you're talking about, please elaborate.
I do know about the planned requirement to require al
One BILLION Dollars! (Score:2)
/pinky /dr.evil
Difficult to Understand (Score:1)
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Re: Difficult to Understand (Score:2)
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Re: Difficult to Understand (Score:2)
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Re:Difficult to Understand (Score:5, Informative)
In your analogy, you (Google), is selling their own items in their garage. In a better analogy, Google operates a flea market where independent sellers come to sell their items, and Google obliges every seller must use Google Pay even when customers have cash, and sellers must eat Google Sawndwiches even they you could use Uber Eats.
Another difference is your garage sale grew to 45 million monthly customers, which the law defines as "dominant position" where the additional obligations apply, such as being open to competitor products in your own flea market.
Re: Difficult to Understand (Score:3)
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Your garage sale has no impact on the national market. The fine is issued under the DMA, a law that specifically applies only to products or services which move so much money (multiple billions in revenue) and affect so many people (double digit millions of monthly active users) that it affects national markets in its industry.
If your garage sale grew to that size it would mean you are Amazon, and you'd be of course obligated to comply with a metric dickload of laws.
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The trumpistani tech companies' inability to generate sufficient demand for their services at home to be profitable without restricting competition has been frustrating to their management for some time, but they thought they had discovered a way to expand their sales by disobeying rules abroad. It used to be a major sales supplement to them and they are not taking well the enforcement of regulations that require competition and respect for user privacy by the EU. But they can more than make that up in Chin
Android (Score:2)
Wait until you hear about the restrictions Google will start placing on Android app developers [keepandroidopen.org] in a couple of months.
I sure hope the EU will be taking them to task for that too. But what are the chances it will make a diff?
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What we really need is something that's been discussed internationally (before Trump): an international authority for taxes, who can punish things like this.
Fines don't work. Antitrust law is broken. (Score:2)