European Commission fines Google €890mn over digital rules breaches

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EU fines Google over digital rules

Highlights

European Commission fines Google a total of €890mn for breaching digital rules, allocating €460mn to preferential search treatment and €430mn to app developer restrictions.
Google must revise its policies within 60 days or face periodic penalties of up to 5 per cent of its average daily turnover under the Digital Markets Act.
The penalties follow over €8bn in previous antitrust fines and risk escalating transatlantic tensions as Alphabet reported revenue of $402.83bn last year.

Digital Markets Act penalties and compliance deadline

As reported by Financial Times, citing the European Commission, Google is fined a total of €890mn for breaching the bloc’s digital rule book, with €460mn tied to preferential treatment of its own services in search results and €430mn linked to restrictions on app developers' ability to steer users to offers outside its channels.

Brussels says Google gives favorable placement to its own shopping, hotel, transport and sports services over third-party rivals in its search engine. The Commission also says the company prevents app developers from freely communicating, promoting offers and concluding contracts with users through distribution channels of their choice, including third-party app stores.

The Commission orders Google to revise its policies within 60 days or face periodic penalties of up to 5 per cent of its average daily turnover. The latest action follows more than €8bn in antitrust fines imposed on the company between 2017 and 2019.

EU competition chief Teresa Ribera calls the decision serious enforcement and says it sends a strong message to Google. Henna Virkkunen, the bloc’s technology chief, says regulators now expect the company to present solutions.

Transatlantic pressure and business impact

Google rejects the EU’s approach, with chief legal officer Kent Walker saying implementation of the Digital Markets Act continues to damage everyday products. He argues the measures do not support fair competition and instead degrade products at the expense of European businesses and consumers.

The penalties risk reviving friction between Brussels and Washington over the regulation of large U.S. technology groups. U.S. President Donald Trump has previously described EU digital fines as overseas extortion and a form of taxation, while earlier actions against American tech companies have triggered threats of retaliation, particularly through trade measures.

Ribera says Brussels cannot base its decisions on what others tell it to do and has a duty to defend the rule of law, including its own laws. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, reported revenue of $402.83bn last year, underscoring the scale of the business facing the EU order.

Our earlier report covered EU governments backing Italy’s Carlo Comporti to become the next chair of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), with the appointment moving to the European Parliament for a hearing and vote. We noted that the leadership change matters for market participants because ESMA sits at the center of EU securities supervision and regulatory coordination across the bloc.

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