Commission opens competition investigation into Google’s online advertising practices

 

 

Commission opens competition investigation into Google’s online advertising practices

The European Commission has launched an antitrust investigation into whether Google has breached the EU competition law prohibitions on restrictive agreements and abuse of a dominant position under Article 101 and 102 TFEU.

The Commission is concerned that Google has favoured its own online display advertising technology services in the 'ad tech' space.  It is investigating whether these practices disadvantage competing advertising technology services providers, advertisers and online publishers.

The Commission will investigate requirements to use certain Google services and Google Ad Manager.  

The Commission is also investigating Google's plans to prohibit the placement of third party cookies on Chrome and replace them with a "Privacy Sandbox".  This will stop making the advertising identifier available to third parties on Android devices when the user ‘opts out’ of personalised advertising.

The Commission will take into account the need to protect privacy, in accordance with the GDPR.  This part of the investigation mirrors a similar inquiry by the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).  The CMA indicated last week that it was minded to close this part of its investigation by allowing the authority to have a role in third party cookies policy.

This EU investigation is high profile and big stakes.  This is the Commission’s fourth antitrust probe into Google relating to technology/IP/IT practices.  It reflects similar themes to the previous Shopping, Android and AdSense investigations.  Google is appealing all these decisions.  The penalties imposed totalled approximately EUR10 billion and required Google to change a host of its business practices.

https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_21_3143