European Commission - Fact Sheet

European Commission - Fact Sheet Antitrust: Commission fines Google €2.42 billion for abusing dominance as search engine by giving illegal advantage to own comparison shopping service - Factsheet Brussels, 27 June 2017 The European Commission has fined Google €2.42 billion for breaching EU antitrust rules. Google has abused its market dominance as a search engine by giving an illegal advantage to another Google product, its comparison shopping service. See also press release. Breach of EU antitrust rules Google's practices amount to an abuse of Google's dominant position in general internet search thereby stifling competition in comparison shopping markets. Google's market dominance Today's Decision concluded that Google is dominant in each national market for general internet search throughout the European Economic Area (EEA), i.e. in all 31 EEA countries. The Commission investigated Google's market position in general internet search since 2008, and the Decision found Google to be dominant in each country since 2008, except in the Czech Republic where the Decision found Google to have been dominant since 2011. This assessment is based on the fact that Google's search engine has held very high market shares in all EEA countries, exceeding 90% in most. It has done so consistently since at least 2008, which is the period investigated by the Commission. There are also high barriers to entry in these markets, in part because of network effects: the more consumers use a search engine, the more attractive it becomes to advertisers. The profits generated can then be used to attract even more consumers. Similarly, the data a search engine gathers about consumers can in turn be used to improve results. Source: StatCounter Google's abuse of dominance Market dominance is, as such, not illegal under EU antitrust rules. However, dominant companies have a special responsibility not to abuse their powerful market position by restricting competition, either in the market where they are dominant or in separate markets. Otherwise, there would be a risk that a company once dominant in one market (even if this resulted from competition on the merits) would be able to use this market power to cement/further expand its dominance, or leverage it into separate markets.