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2024: Google recognized as a monopoly

Google lost an antitrust case over its dominant position in the US market. A federal judge in the District of Columbia ruled that the company abused its position to suppress its competitors. This was announced on August 7, 2024 by the press service of Anton Nemkin, a member of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy, Information Technology and Communications.

Including Google spent billions of dollars on exclusive deals aimed at maintaining its own monopoly in the search engines segment. For example, the company "bought" the pre-installation of the search engine in browsers of smartphone manufacturers.

This victory over Google is a historic victory for the American people, "Attorney General Merrick Garland said.

It is reported that the US Department of Justice agreed with the decision.

By entering into priority contracts with smartphone manufacturers, including Apple, the company, in fact, deprived the right to choose users in different countries of the world. For a long time, the search engine was in the lead in Russia, but Yandex managed to reach a share of 63% in 2023. At the same time, the Russian search engine took the lead in all segments, even on the iPhone, the share of users exceeded 50%. This is a worthy result, which is once again confirmed - Russian companies can compete with technological giants, while not in administrative, but in market ways, - said the deputy.

American IT giants have long become separate subjects of US public life, which act exclusively in their own interests. Antitrust proceedings against the company, by the way, have now begun in the European Union within the framework of the law on "Digital Markets," the deputy said.

2023

Increased EU censorship

in April European Union 2023, requires expanded censorship by social media, including, and Twitter Google. Facebook Internet Europe's top regulator Thierry Breton said "19 online platforms and search engines have a particular responsibility to make Internet it safer."

The EU uses the same excuse as: USA preventing harm. "Companies will have to do more to combat misinformation, give users more protection and choice, and provide stronger protection for children, or risk fines of up to 6% of their global turnover," reports. Reuters

US Department of Justice demanded that Google sell advertising technologies

The US Department of Justice in January 24, 2023 filed a lawsuit against the American corporation Google in connection with its position in the online advertising market .

The Department of Justice, together with the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Virginia, filed a civil antitrust lawsuit against Google over numerous cases of monopolization of digital advertising products, the text of the statement published on the website of the US Department of Justice.

The statement of claim requires Google to sell its advertising technologies, such as a service for buying and selling advertising, a platform for making deals with advertising and a service for displaying advertising on the Internet, the New York Times notes. According to Reuters, advertising accounted for 12% of the company's revenue for 2021.

Google used anti-competitive and illegal means to prevent any threat to its dominance over digital advertising technology, the Justice Department complaint said.

Google, in turn, believes that the court against the company will lead to a weakening of innovation, an increase in advertising prices on the Internet and complicate work for thousands of small companies that could be promoted through advertising. The company also said that its practice is open and comparable to the methods of other large corporations^[1] Department of^[2] that^[3].

2022

US to ban Apple and Google from hosting pay-in-yuan apps

The US will ban Apple and Google from hosting pay-in-yuan apps. This became known on May 27, 2022.

US senators believe digital yuan allows China to spy on Americans

Under the bill, app stores "should not host or support U.S. apps that allow transactions in e-CNY. The bill was put forward by Senators Tom Cotton, Marco Rubio and Mike Brown.

With the digital yuan, Cotton said, the Chinese government can "track all transactions in real time. This creates privacy and security concerns for Americans who pay in China's digital currency.

The bill was introduced after Chinese apps began accepting payment in e-CNY. For example, messenger WeChat with more than 1.2 billion users and a payment application Alipay , they support payment in Chinese digital currency and are available in and. Apple stores Google

The Chinese embassy in Washington called the bill "another example of wanton intimidation of foreign companies."

The United States unreasonably abuses state power for national security, the Chinese Embassy in Washington added[4] from [5].

Roskomnadzor demanded that Google stop spreading false advertising messages and blocked Google News

Roskomnadzor demanded that Google stop distributing false advertising messages. This became known on March 3, 2022.

In recent days, YouTube began to distribute commercials against the military operation RUSSIAN FEDERATION on. To Ukraine

Users also reported videos in which they allegedly captured Russian soldiers, who say on camera that they did not want to go to Ukraine and ask their relatives to take them home.

Roskomnadzor has previously sent a demand to Google, which owns YouTube video hosting, to restrict access to inaccurate content as part of Google Ads contextual advertising. As reported, for the spread of fakes, a fine of up to 5 million rubles is threatened, and the case materials will be transferred to the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation.

Roskomnadzor demands that the video hosting administration immediately revise the terms of moderation of advertising content, as well as stop demonstrating it to Russian users. The agency considers it unacceptable to use YouTube in the information war against Russia, including using the advertising capabilities of the platform.

The State Duma plans to adopt a law according to which it faces up to 15 years in prison for disseminating false information about BP of the Russian Federation. The adoption of such a law is planned on March 4 at a plenary session^[6].

On March 23, 2022, against the background of a special operation by Russia To Ukraine Roskomnadzor , he announced a blocking Google News for distribution. fake news

2021

Lobbying costs in the EU - €5.75 million

At the end of August 2021, the costs of leading IT companies to lobby their interests in the European Union became known. Google spends about €5.75 million annually. Read more here.

France fined Google €500 million euros for refusing to pay local media

In July 2021, the antimonopoly regulator France fined Google €500 million ($593 million). dollars

The search giant failed to comply with an order to strike a fair deal with publishers to use their news content on its platform.

Alphabet's division ignored a 2020 decision to negotiate in good faith to show snippets of articles on its Google News service.

Lawsuit from 37 states in the United States for antitrust violations

In July 2021, more than half of the American states (Washington and 36 states) filed a class action lawsuit against Google for violations of antitrust laws.

The plaintiffs are trying to challenge the company's dominant position in the device application market on, operating system Android as well as charging 30% commission from application developers on any sale of digital goods and services.

They also point out that Google controls 90% of the Android app market, and no other digital store has more than 5% of the market.

At the same time, other app stores cannot be downloaded from Google Play. Third-party app stores are prohibited from buying ads on Google or YouTube.

France fines Google €220m for abusing advertising position in tech sector

The antimonopoly authority France in June 2021 fined Google 220 million euros ($268 million) dollars for abusing its position in relation to advertising in the technology sector.

€102 million fine in Italy for abuse of dominant position

The Antimonopoly Service Italy in May 2021 fined the American company Google more than €102 million euros for abuse of dominant position.

The fine stems from the internet giant's refusal to host a third-party app on its Google Play digital store to find charging stations for electric vehicles.

"Thanks to operating system Android the Google Play store, Google is in a dominant position that allows it to control the access of application developers to end users," the document says.

2020

French regulator fined Google and Amazon €100 million and €35 million, respectively

On December 10, 2020 TASS Information Agency of Russia , he announced that the national commission on to computer science freedoms France imposed fines on companies Google Amazon in the amount of €100 million and €35 million, respectively, for non-compliance with cookie legislation ("cookies," a small fragment data sent to server the web and stored on the computer user). This is stated in statements on the regulator's website.

According to him, companies placed cookies on users' computers without prior notification and consent. At the same time, pop-up banners that were supposed to inform about the placement of cookies did not give proper explanations about the actions taken.

The regulator notes that companies have three months to debug the system for properly informing users, for each day of delay Google and Amazon will receive €100,000 fines^[7].

US Department of Justice prepares to file antitrust lawsuit against Google

On October 20, 2020, it became known that the US Department of Justice plans to file a lawsuit against Alphabet Inc. Google, accusing the company of violating competition in the field of search services and advertising.

The lawsuit against Google could be the most aggressive move by the US authorities against the company dominant in the technology sector over the past two decades, the newspaper said. The Ministry of Justice intends to accuse Google of concluding agreements that prevent competitors from accessing the sector.

In addition, US authorities claim that Google paid manufacturers, mobile phones operators communications and - Internetbrowsers such Safari the AmericanApple as Inc., to install Google as the default search engine. The Ministry of Justice also intends to challenge the practice of pre-installing the Google search application on phones with. operating system Android

According to authorities, Google, through revenue-sharing provisions, prevents competing search engines from being pre-installed on phones. Google owns or controls channels that account for roughly 80% of U.S. searches, according to authorities. As a result, other search engines can't get enough queries to compete with Google, consumers face limited elections and advertisers face inflated prices.

It is expected that the attorneys general of more than 10 states will support the lawsuit of the Ministry of Justice, Interfax notes. Google did not respond to a request for comment, but the company has previously said that its competitive advantage is that billions of people choose its service every day.

The US Department of Justice investigation into Google lasted more than a year and took place amid an audit of several technology companies in the country. If Google loses the case, the company may be forced to reorganize the business in accordance with a court decision. The Ministry of Justice in its statement of claim will not indicate possible ways to eliminate the violation, but one of the officials did not rule out that Google may be obliged to carry out structural changes.

Google's victory would deal a blow to investigations of other big tech companies in the US. According to the source, the litigation may last several years and end under the president, who will win the November 3 elections, the^[8] Department of^[9].

11 states file antitrust lawsuit against Google

In October 2020, the Justice Department filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google by 11 states.

• "It maintains monopoly power through prohibitive methods that are harmful to competition."

• If the Justice Department does not enforce antitrust laws, "we could lose the next wave of innovation."

• Exclusive deals with phone makers protect Google's monopoly, said Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen.

The bodies of the American prosecutor's office will keep in sight and other technology companies after filing a lawsuit against Google - US Department of Justice.

Officials call the US lawsuit against Google historic and compare it to a "case AT&T," after which the powerful telephone monopoly was divided into 9 parts.

The possible consequences for Google are billions in fines or forced separation.

US authorities want to force Google to sell Chrome and part of the advertising business

Ministry of Justice and the attorney general USA wants an order to sell to Google browser Chrome a third-party company. This became known on October 12, 2020. Such a step will defeat the monopoly formed on the market. The trial is scheduled to begin soon. At the same time, after the aforementioned lawsuit, the US authorities will file a lawsuit against the one operating system Android used by Google.

According to the source, the authorities intend to oblige the company to sell part of the assets through the court. At the same time, prosecutors consult on this issue with Google competitors and outside companies - they together have to decide which part of the business they will require in the lawsuit.

The Ministry of Justice is unhappy that Google is refusing to support third-party cookies in its browser. Also, companies are accused of promoting their own products by placing them on the first lines of search results. And using an automated platform to purchase the DoubleClickBidManager advertising tool (it is fully integrated with all GoogleAnalytics 360 Suite products).

Proving that tech giants are monopolists that harm consumers is difficult, as corporations like Google provide most of their services for free using ads. At the same time, many experts are concerned that the indictment of the corporation almost before the general election is a purely political decision.

According to the conclusions of anti-monopoly officials, 81% of network requests from computers and 94% on mobile devices go through the Google browser in the United States. This leads to the fact that the company can independently set standards throughout the industry. A similar situation in the late 1990s and early 2000s developed for Microsoft with its Internet Explorer (browser), but then government agencies did not interfere in what was happening on the network^[10].

European Commission launches antitrust investigation into Google over Fitbit deal

On August 5, 2020, it became known that the European Commission began an in-depth audit against Google due to the company's plans to buy the manufacturer of smartwatches and fitness bracelets Fitbit for $2.1 billion.

The source recalled that Google announced plans to buy Fitbit in early November 2019.

The regulator's concern is the fact that Google may use the information that Fitbit smartwatches and fitness bracelets collect to strengthen its position in the advertising market.

Data collected with wearable devices appears to be... are an important advantage in the online advertising markets, the European Commission noted.

The regulator stressed that in the event of a deal, it will be more difficult for competitors to match Google's advertising services. At the same time, the company responded to the regulator's concerns by promising not to use the data collected from Fitbit devices for targeted advertising and place them in a separate virtual storage. The European Commission was not satisfied with this promise.

Also of concern to the European regulator is the impact of the Fitbit deal on the digital healthcare market in Europe and the compatibility of competing fitness tracking devices with Android^[11].

Google began paying tax on Internet services in Uzbekistan

On April 24, 2020, it became known that Google began paying tax on Internet services in Uzbekistan. Amendments were introduced to the country's tax code providing for the introduction of the so-called "tax on Google" on companies providing digital services. Read more here.

2019

Google forced to curtail tax evasion scheme

In early January 2020, Google announced that it would curtail the tax scheme that the company used to defer taxes on tens of billions of dollars in profits.

For several years, Google used a legal loophole known as the "Irish two" or "Dutch sandwich" to reduce the amount of taxes. It allowed Google and many other corporations to transfer money through shell companies and thereby save them from taxes. The Internet giant established a subsidiary in a country with a low tax rate and transferred its profits to this "daughter" in the form of payments that were not subject to taxation. Google transferred profits made in the United States and the European Union to Bermuda through Irish and Dutch subsidiaries, and in the documentation indicated these payments as fees for licensing intellectual property.

Documents obtained by Reuters show that Google transferred $24.5 billion in profits to Bermuda in 2018 and $22.2 billion in 2017. The company will abandon this trick during 2020, although the exact date has not yet been indicated.

Facing mounting pressure from the EU and the US, Ireland has closed those loopholes by promising to comply with new tax rules in 2020. In turn, the tax authorities plan to introduce new rules that should limit the ability of large multinational corporations to cut taxes at the expense of shell firms. Google decided to change its approach to taxation just in time to comply with new regulations in the future.

We are now simplifying our corporate structure and will license intellectual property from the United States, not Bermuda, a Google spokesperson said.[12]

Google to pay France €1bn for long-term tax evasion

On September 12, 2019, it became known about the settlement of the proceedings over non-payment of taxes Google in. France The company agreed to pay the authorities in the amount of almost 1 billion euros.

For about four years, an investigation into Google's suspicion of tax evasion has lasted in France since 2015. According to the prosecutor's office, the company does not fully declare profits from activities in France. This could be due to a loophole in international tax law. The company conducted the bulk of sales through Ireland, where it has its headquarters.

Google records the bulk of its sales in European countries in the Irish division, and therefore a significant part of the company's taxes are paid in Ireland.

According to Google lawyer Antonen Levy, an agreement was concluded in September 2019 that settled all past disputes once and for all.

We have settled all the tax and related proceedings that have been conducted in France over the years, the company said in a statement quoted by Reuters.

According to the terms of the agreement, Google will pay a one-time fine of 500 million euros, and will also transfer additional taxes to France totaling 465 million euros. The agreement on the regulation of the case was approved by the French court on September 12, 2019.

French Budget Minister Gerald Darmanen told Le Figaro that the Google deal would set a legal precedent and added that authorities were also negotiating with other companies of different calibers. With whom exactly, the politician did not specify.

The investigation into Google was launched in connection with a complaint by the Regional Office of Public Finance of the Ile-de-France metropolitan area, which concerned the company's refusal to file a tax return in 2011-2014.^[13]

Roskomnadzor accused Google and Facebook of interfering in elections

Roskomnadzor accused Facebook and Google of illegally distributing political materials on a "day of silence" before the elections of deputies on September 9, 2019. The department said that such actions can be considered as "interference in the sovereign affairs of Russia and obstruction of democratic elections." Read more here.

France will oblige to block hostile content in search engines

France approved amendments in July 2019 that would require tech companies such as Facebook and Google to remove content considered "hate speech" by the French government, The Verge reported.

This provision, which is part of a major bill on Internet regulation, was passed by the lower house of the French parliament on July 4, 2019. If fully approved, social media will have to remove hostile language from its platforms within 24 hours once it is identified. The bill will be submitted to the upper house of parliament, their Senate, for subsequent debate.

The language included in the measure requires companies to remove any content that incites or encourages violence or discrimination based on hate, race or religion. If platforms do not remove content within this period, they may face a fine of up to €1.25 million.

Google trains AI to prevent US presidential election from repeating "Trump situation"

On June 25, 2019, it became known that Google it was working to prevent USA a repetition of the "situation with" in the presidential elections in 2020, Trump which developed in 2016. This was announced in a private conversation by the head of the responsible innovation department at Google Jen Gennai. The conversation was recorded on a hidden camera by Project Veritas, which investigates corruption, fraud and human rights abuses.

[[:Шаблон:Quote 'author = said Jen Gennai, head of responsible innovation at Google]]

After the 2016 elections, a number of scandals erupted in the United States related to the spread of fake news during the pre-election period and other attempts to influence the consciousness of voters through large Internet platforms.

Gennai also commented on Senator Elizabeth Warren's proposal to disband Google, along with other large technology companies.

[[:Шаблон:Quote 'author = commented Jen Gennai, head of responsible innovation at Google]]

After posting the Project Veritas video, Jennai commented on her remarks. She reported that it was a casual conversation with someone in a restaurant and she used inaccurate language. YouTube removed that copy of the video that was posted on its website.

Google's Responsible Innovation Unit monitors and evaluates the responsible use of artificial intelligence.

[[:Шаблон:Quote 'author = reported by Jen Gennai, head of responsible innovation at Google]]

In addition to Gennai's words, Project Veritas has received documentary evidence from a Google insider that the company uses so-called "fair machine learning," which should compensate for the "injustice of algorithms."

"Unfairness of algorithms" is the unfair or prejudiced treatment of different groups of people based on their race or gender, sexual orientation, or income level, the document says. Here is an example: at the request of the "CEO," Google search shows mainly men. Despite the fact that this is a correct representation of the real situation in the world, this is regarded as an injustice of the algorithm in relation to women and is subject to adjustment.

An insider claims the same logic is being used by Google to push a political agenda.

Project Veritas also has documents at its disposal that show what Google is guided by when it prioritizes content from various news publishers. The company's goal is to reduce the risk of disseminating poor-quality and inaccurate information through Google News in order to get a "single point of truth" for all Google services, the documentation says.

One of the documents describes Google's news ecosystem and confirms that it has certain editorial rules that the company itself sets. The rules determine how content is distributed and displayed on Google's website. Judging by the documents, the company itself makes decisions about what news to show and promote on the site.

The meaning of the documents echoes Gennai's statement that Google prefers news from reliable sources, which do not include some conservative resources. The insider claims that YouTube's recommendation mechanism is deliberately adjusted to reduce the influence of journalists like Dave Rubin or Tim Pool.

Also at the disposal of Project Veritas were documents called "Justice is not the default" and "People (like us) are programmed." The documents describe how algorithms interact with unconscious biases^[14] users^[15]

Apple, Google and Microsoft published an open letter to the British intelligence service against the interception of encrypted correspondence

In May 2019, an international coalition, which included public organizations, security experts and technology companies (including Apple, Google, Microsoft and WhatsApp), published^[16] open letter to^[17] UK Government Communications Center (DIN), in which it opposed the initiative proposed by the DIN to intercept encrypted correspondence. According to the authors of the letter, the proposal put forward in 2018 by the special services violates human rights, threatens security and undermines the confidence of citizens. From an open letter:

"The phantom DIN protocol poses a serious threat to digital security: if implemented, the authentication process will be undermined, allowing users to make sure that they communicate with exactly who they think. The protocol will also add potential hidden vulnerabilities and increase the risk of improper and unauthorized use of[18] systems[19]. The presence of cybersecurity threats will mean that users will no longer be able to trust the protection of their communications, as they will not be sure that they really know who they are communicating with. Thus, there is a violation of fundamental human rights, including the right to privacy and freedom of expression. Moreover, new potential vulnerabilities will appear in communication systems, and there will be a risk of their malicious exploitation. "

The idea of ​ ​ the phantom protocol proposed by the DIN is to provide an opportunity for law enforcement agencies and special services to secretly add hidden interlocutors to encrypted chats from users. The proposal was published for discussion in the fall of 2018.

The authors of the initiative are Ian Levy, a specialist at the UK's National Cyber ​ ​ Security Center, and Crispin Robinson, a representative of the DIN. In their opinion, such an "exclusive access mechanism" can be built into platforms in order to provide law enforcement officers with the ability to bypass end-to-end encryption.

"We do not mean weakening encryption or abandoning end-to-end encryption. We are talking about blocking notifications on the target device and, possibly, on the devices of the interlocutors. This is a completely different proposal for discussion without the need to touch encryption, "the authors of the project said.

EU fines Google €1.5bn for blocking rival ads on third-party sites

On March 20, 2019, the European Commission imposed a fine on Google in the amount of 1.49 billion euros (1.29% of the company's revenue for 2018) for showing anti-competitive actions when selling online advertising.

Since 2006, Google has entered into contracts with third-party sites that barred them from advertising the company's competitors on its search results pages, according to the antitrust regulator. Google's ads also got the "best" spots on the site.

The violation was that together with the search window from Google, which was installed by various websites (such as travel services or online newspapers), the company also demanded to install the AdSence contextual advertising service and forbade advertising its competitors through it, clarifies. Reuters

Google has strengthened its dominance in online search advertising and protects itself from competitive pressure by imposing anti-competitive contractual restrictions on third-party websites. This is illegal under EU antitrust rules. Unfair behavior continued for more than 10 years and deprived other companies of the opportunity to adequately compete and innovate , and consumers of the benefits of competition, said Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, in charge of competition policy.

The regulator also pointed to other Google violations. For example, the company is accused of taking to the first positions when searching for its partners, and also paying manufacturers of mobile devices and operating systems to include pre-installed Google-based search applications.

This is the third fine in two years issued by the Google European Commission for abuse of dominant market position. Taking into account the verdict issued on March 20, 2019, the company paid a total of 8.15 billion euros.^[20]

US presidential candidate proposes splitting Apple, Google, Amazon and Facebook

In mid-March 2019 USA Elizabeth Warren , the senator and Democratic presidential candidate proposed breaking up tech companies like,, and Apple. Facebook Amazon Google The senator's campaign received support on social networks. More. here

2018

US lobbying spending $21.2 million

At the end of January 2019, a US federal lobbying report was issued, according to which in 2018 the five largest technology companies in the country spent $64.3 million on lobbying government officials. Google's spending for these purposes amounted to $21.2 million. Read more here.

Record €4.34 billion fine in EU for requiring Android device providers to install Google search

On July 18, 2018, the European Commission (EC) announced a fine of €4.34 billion on Google for infringing on competitors using the Android operating system. This monetary penalty was a record for antitrust regulators not only in Europe, but also in the world.

According to the European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager, Google limits the work of manufacturers and mobile operators so that traffic on their Android devices goes across  the Google search system.

Google has used Android as a vehicle to increase its search engine's dominance. Such practices deprive competitors of the opportunity to develop innovation and essentially compete. They leave European consumers without the benefits of effective competition in the important mobile sphere, Vestager said.

She demanded that Google within 90 days stop actions that interfere with free competition, as part of contracts with smartphone manufacturers and telecommunications operators. Otherwise, the American Internet giant may be additionally fined up to 5% of the average daily turnover of parent holding Alphabet.

Google's antitrust charges were divided into three counts. First, according to the EC, the company forced Android device manufacturers to pre-install Google services on their equipment, including the search engine and the Chrome browser.

Those vendors and operators who used only Google applications in their categories received financial rewards.

Another count relates to the fact that manufacturers installing Google applications were prohibited from using alternative versions of Android - the so-called forks. One of the most famous such assemblies is Fire OS from Amazon.^[21]

Thanks to this policy, Google has strengthened its own position in Internet search, limited the ability of other mobile browsers to compete with Chrome and prevented the emergence of other operating systems, concluded European Commissioner for Competition Margaret Vestager.

The commission carefully assessed Google's arguments that these restrictions are necessary to prevent the "fragmentation" of the Android system , and concluded that they are not justified, the EC said in a statement.

According to Bloomberg, the amount of 4.34 billion euros has become the largest that companies have ever been fined for violating antitrust laws. This monetary penalty roughly corresponds to the annual payments of Holland to the budget of the European Union.

In 2017, Google was ordered to pay 2.4 billion euros for the fact that when issuing results to user requests, the system gave priority to its own Google Shopping service. Thus, over two years, the company will pay a total of 6.7 billion euros for anti-competitive practices. However, this amount could rise: by July 2018, the European regulator is conducting another investigation, which concerns possible discrimination in the conclusion of contracts for the sale of contextual advertising.

The maximum possible fine in antitrust cases in Europe is 10% of annual revenue. Based on the fact that Alphabet earned about $110.9 billion in 2017 (almost all revenues come from Google), the company was fined 5% of revenue or the amount earned in about 16 days.

Bloomberg emphasizes that any attempts by Google to appeal the EC decision will not change it. The only thing the company can achieve is to postpone the payment of the fine. Google reported its disagreement with the conclusions of the EC.

Android has created more, not less, opportunities for everyone. A powerful ecosystem, rapid innovation and lower prices are classic signs of reliable competition, the company said.

Google bans use of its servers to bypass government-imposed locks

App developers will no longer be able to use Google's infrastructure to bypass Internet locks. The hosting service of sites and web applications on, servers Google which is called, Google App Engine has closed the possibilities for using the technology of hiding the final address, known as domain fronting^[22]

The company did not make any statements about this - the first changes in the network architecture were noticed by the Tor developers, which attracted media attention to the problem.

Domain fronting allowed developers to use Google as a proxy, redirecting traffic to their own servers through the domain Google.com. This made it possible to bypass state-level locks, in which all traffic sent to a certain service can be blocked. When using domain fronting, all country-specific requests appear to be directed to Google.com. Encryption prevented the supervisory authorities from tracking them further.

Google told The Verge that the shutdown of domain fronting occurred as a result of a long-planned update. The company claims that domain fronting was never a specially supported feature - it was just a bizarre feature of Google's software platform. Now this feature has been eliminated during the continuous update of networks, and the company does not plan to revive it as a function.

Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter and Google will fight terrorism online

Tech giants Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter and Google will join forces in the fight against terrorist content on the Web, RIA Novosti reported in October. The decision was the result of a meeting of company representatives with the heads of the G7 Ministry of Internal Affairs, which took place on October 20 on the Italian island of Ischia.

Representatives of the companies participated in a session dedicated to the fight against terrorism on the Internet. The meeting participants agreed to strengthen cooperation in several areas. Thus, companies intend to share automated technologies that will help quickly identify and remove terrorist content. Cooperation will allow the exchange of the most effective technologies in order to improve the protection of small companies. In addition, it is planned to expand the information base with the help of scientific research.

Fine in India $21 million for distorting the results of the issuance in search

As it became known in February 2017, the Indian Competition Protection Commission (CCI) imposed a fine of 1.36 billion rupees ($21 million) on the American corporation Google "for abuse of dominant position" in the segment of online search engines and search for advertising services.

According to the CCI (PDF), Google deliberately issued search results in such a way as to increase traffic to its own Google Flight service.

In addition, according to CCI, the Internet giant limited the use of competing search services for those companies that built the Google search engine into their sites.^[23]

Record US lobbying spending

At the end of January 2018, it became known that the American IT giants Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google in 2017 spent a record amount on lobbying their interests and trying to influence the American authorities - almost $50 million.

The most generous in terms of costs was Google Corporation: the Internet giant spent over $18 million on lobbying its own interests, more than any other technology company. Like other industry representatives, Google has tried to prevent the introduction of stricter content and advertising rules for its services, including Internet search and YouTube. Read more here.

2017

Participation in a meeting with G7 Interior Ministers in Italy

Tech giants Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter and Google will join forces in the fight against terrorist content on the Web, RIA Novosti reported in October. The decision was the result of a meeting of company representatives with the heads of the G7 Ministry of Internal Affairs, which took place on October 20, 2017 on the Italian island of Ischia.

Representatives of the companies participated in a session dedicated to the fight against terrorism on the Internet. The meeting participants agreed to strengthen cooperation in several areas. Thus, companies intend to share automated technologies that will help quickly identify and remove terrorist content. Cooperation will allow the exchange of the most effective technologies in order to improve the protection of small companies. In addition, it is planned to expand the information base with the help of scientific research.

Commissioning research to influence public opinion and policy makers

Google Corporation spends millions on scientific research in the United States and Europe in order to influence public opinion and politicians with their help. This is stated in the report of the American analytical center Campaign for Accountability (CfA), published on July 11, 2017, reports The Guardian.^[24]

The organization found that over the past decade, Google has funded hundreds of research works directly or indirectly that are in the business interests of the corporation and protect it in the regulatory sphere.

{{quote 'With its vast financial resources and power, Google is trying to influence political bodies at all levels. Regulators should at a minimum know that Google is behind the supposedly independent legal and academic work they rely on, says CfA chief executive Daniel Stevens. ^[25]

According to CfA, between 2005 and 2017, Google sponsored 329 public policy research papers authored by researchers and economists from leading world institutions, including Oxford Edinburgh,,, and the Stanford Harvard Massachusetts Institute of Technology Berlin School of Economics.

In more than half of the cases, the scientists were directly funded by Google, and the rest were sponsored indirectly, through Google-backed organizations. In two-thirds of cases, the authors of the work, who received from Google from $5,000 to $400,000 for them, did not disclose the sources of their funding. Of this number, 26% of researchers received funds directly from Google.

In response to CfA's publication, a note appeared on Google's blog in which the corporation criticizes the report and calls it misinforming, since the calculations took into account any scientific work commissioned by any organization that has ever received money from Google.

Google also called it a bitter irony that, calling on researchers for transparency, CfA itself does not disclose its sources of funding. Meanwhile, it is known that one of the sponsors of the organization is Oracle, which is waging an active lobbying war against Google.^[26]

Participating in the protest against the abolition of the principle of network neutrality in the United States

More than 80,000 websites, including, and Facebook Amazon , Google took part in an online protest against the Communications Commission's (USA FCC) plan to abolish the principle of network neutrality.

The principle was introduced during the Barack CNBC in 2015, CNBC reported. It provides that Internet service providers (such as Comcast, Charter and AT&T) must equally provide access to all Internet content. In other words, providers are prohibited from blocking content, speeding up or slowing down data transfer from certain websites^[27][28]

The principle of network neutrality came under threat in May 2017 after the FCC voted to repeal it. According to the commission, the lack of regulation will lead to increased investment in new technologies. However, web companies did not agree with the regulator.

"The FCC should listen to the voices of real people who will be affected by the attack on network neutrality, not just telecommunication company lobbyists in pursuit of more power," Evan Greer, head of the Fight for the Future protest campaign, tweeted. - The purpose of the protest... is that ordinary people have a voice and be heard by decision-makers in Washington, D.C. No one, regardless of their political affiliation, wants their cable company to control what they see and do online, or charge extra for access to the content they want. "

The European Commission fined Google €2.42 billion for understating competitors in search results

In June 2017, the European Commission fined Google a record amount of €2.42 billion for abusing its dominant position in the EU search engines market. ^[29].

Earlier, the Financial Times reported^[30]the fine imposed^[31] European Commission could exceed €1 billion, which could already set a new record. However, the final amount of the fine turned out to be significantly higher.

In the message^[32] of the European Commission, it is noted that the results of searching for goods through the Google search engine were distorted in favor of Google Shopping's own service. To increase the number of customers of their own service, the ratings of competing projects were significantly underestimated, as a result of which their offers were not issued on the first page of the search.

The report of the European Commission says that its experiments showed that the proposals of the main competitor Google Shopping were issued on average on the fourth page, and the proposals of other competitors even further. This approach allowed Google to significantly increase the popularity of its own service.

Experts from the European Commission note that consumers are more likely to click on offers than they are more noticeable, that is, the higher they are in Google search results, and even on desktop computers (on mobile devices with a small screen, the difference is even more noticeable), the first ten results on the first page receive a total of about 95% of all clicks (including the first about 35%). For comparison, the first result on the second page accounts for an average of only 1% of clicks.

"This means that by providing the best place for its own shopping comparison service and lowering the ratings of competitors, Google provided its own service with a significant advantage over competitors," the European Commission said in a report.

Google should refuse to use dishonest practices no later than 90 days. Otherwise, the company could face a new fine of up to 5% of the global daily revenue of its "parent" company Alphabet.

Google faces $9 billion fine for distorting search results

European antitrust regulators intend to fine Google search engine for competition violations. About this in May 2017 writes Reuters with reference to its own sources in Google. The amount of the fine, according to the terms of EU antimonopoly legislation, can be up to 10% of the global turnover of the violating company - in this case, about $9 billion^[33].

The decision on a large fine will be made following a seven-year investigation: the search engine received dozens of complaints from American and European competitors. The authors of the complaints claimed that Google deliberately distorted Internet search results by targeting users to its own marketplace - the Google Shopping marketplace - thereby "harming both market participants and consumers."

Google and its parent company Alphabet do not comment on the prospect of a multibillion-dollar fine. Previously, these American companies rejected the claims of antitrust regulators, saying that regulators did not take into account the ongoing competition between online retailers Amazon and eBay, which "are the largest players in the Internet space," in their investigation.

In addition, Google said that "the evolution of search results pages is aimed at improving their quality and user experience, and not abusing the company's position in the search market." "By showing search results for people interested in shopping, we understood that we needed to go beyond the old-fashioned" 10 blue links "(a search option from which Google began to move away in 2015) in order to keep up with competitors and provide the best services to users. We have developed new ways to organize and rank a product, providing it to users in a convenient format in search and ads. In 2012, as part of this effort, in addition to our traditional ads, we introduced Google Shopping as a new advertising format - we don't think the format is anti-competitive, "noted a Google blog post in 2015.

2016: Google is friends with the US and EU governments - they are friends with Google

On June 10, 2016, facts about Google's ties with the government USA and national governments became known. European Union The information was published by the Campaign for Accountability (CfA^[34]

The CfA investigation (the company is investigating cases of corporate influence on the government) resulted in two reports on the results of the Google Transparency Project. One discloses data on the corporation's relations with the US government, and the second - with the governments of the European Union. Ties turned out to be close.

According to the first report, during the presidency of Barack Obama (from January 2009 to October 31, 2015), Google lobbyists visited the White House more than 427 times.

These visits include:

• 363 meetings between officials and Google employees;
• 64 meetings attended by employees of companies, the sole owner of which is the former CEO of Google, now the head of the board of directors of Alphabet (whose "daughter" is Google) Eric Schmidt.

The meetings were attended by at least 169 top Google managers (from directors to software developers) and 182 US government representatives.

The statistics exclude large receptions at the White House, such as holidays, gala dinners or conferences. Most of the meetings took place one-on-one or in the presence of a small group of Google employees and one or two officials.

At the same time, at least 21 times the president himself met with "Googlers" Obama - and these were "intimate" meetings, with a small number of participants. At least 20 times, Google management has received an audience with key political and economic advisers, Obama according to the CfA report.

More than 100 times, top managers of the corporation appeared in the White House at official meetings on the development of strategy in various fields, in particular, at meetings of the Committee on Science and Technology; the Management and Budget Committee; National Economy Council; National Security Council, etc.

The subject of meetings attended by "Googlers" is surprisingly wide. These are the questions:

• intellectual property,
• digital media development strategies,
• biotechnology,
• government contracts,
• climate change,
• foreign policy,
• national security,
• antitrust regulation,
• telecommunications and media,
• health care,
• space and aeronautics.

All this indicates that the corporation's influence on the White House goes far beyond Google's core "search" business.

Representatives of the venture capital fund Google Ventures met with officials five times, participants in the Google X "lunar program" were also seen at the White House.

Employees of Eric Schmidt's private venture fund Tomorrow Ventures made 14 visits to the government. Another of Schmidt's companies, Civis Analytics, sent walkers to the White House at least 51 times. Several Google programmers, in addition, tried to save the failed HealthCare.gov project in 2013.

The regularity of visits by Google employees to the White House has attracted press attention before. It was especially noted that during the antitrust investigation against Google in 2012 (more on the investigation here > > >), company representatives also had access to senior representatives of the Obama administration, and also met with representatives of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which led the investigation.

Analysts remind that one of the key topics of Barack Obama's first election campaign was to reduce the influence of lobbyists on government policy. However, statistics show that this influence has increased significantly over the years of the Obama presidency. As for Eric Schmidt, he said in 2010 that he was shocked by the level of corporate influence on the White House.

The average American doesn't even imagine how many laws are written by lobbyists. It's a shock to find out how the system actually works. Eric Schmidt, head of Alphabet's board of directors

In March 2016, Schmidt himself was appointed head of the innovation advisory board at the US Department of Defense.

European Union

Members of the governments of the European Union, leading an "irreconcilable struggle" with the American technology giant, have actively collaborated with Google over the past 10 years, the CfA report noted. Google Transparency Project has identified 80 similar "activities."

Since 2005, Google has hired at least 65 former governmental officials from different EU countries. Among the latest examples is the former Lithuanian ambassador-at-large and an adviser from France the European Parliament. Both were hired by Google as lobbyists in 2015.

There is a movement in the opposite direction - Google employees are switching to the civil service. Since 2005, 15 employees of the corporation have been appointed to government posts in different countries of Europe, acquiring wide connections and being included in the epicenter of the political decision-making process. The most striking example is again Eric Schmidt, who joined the business council of British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Hiring members of the government is part of Google's strategy to regain the influence of the corporation after an attempt to hush up an antitrust investigation of the European Commission in 2014, said Margaret Hodge, a Labour MP since 1994. In her opinion, being as close as possible to government and political decision-making is the basis of Google's business model.

One gets the impression that, unlike other large American corporations like Apple, Google inspires a sacred awe of European ministers. Margaret Hodge, UK Labour MP since 1994

While in the United States Google has been quite successful in dealing with various regulatory obstacles, in which the To Europe company's search engine's share in the online search market is approaching 90%, Google has faced resistance from the European Commission, which has accused the corporation of abusing its dominant position and dishonest competition with companies developing applications for. Android

The European Commission initiated the first antitrust investigation in 2011, after which Google's "recruiting" activity in the bureaucratic environment increased sharply. In 2011, the company hired 18 European officials - more than twice as many as the previous year and more than three times as many as any year in the decade considered in the study.

Although there is less data on Google's "communication" with Euro ministers than information on the corporation's meetings with American officials, the information obtained demonstrates that Google is most interested in the UK. In the United Kingdom, the corporation hired employees from at least 17 departments, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Prime Minister's Office, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Treasury, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Transport, etc. Since 2005, the number of British officials recruited has been at least 26 - from both of the country's main political parties.

Some personnel "purchases" can be associated with Google's success in Britain. For example, in 2015, the company hired a former budget adviser to the British Treasury - and a few months later it became known that Google had reached an agreement with the UK authorities to pay £130 million (approximately $185 million) in lost taxes and raise the tax rate in the future. The amount of the deal has been repeatedly criticised as "disproportionately small." In January 2016, EU Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager announced that she was ready to investigate the agreement.

The report also cited other examples of former officials hired by the corporation helping Google strike deals that were beneficial to the company.

Google was spotted hiring members of the European Parliament, representatives of NATO, the Ministry of Economy of Poland, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania, the Ministry of Justice of Spain, etc.

Five people from the "recruited" made a "full cycle" - first leaving the government for Google and then returning to power again, the researchers noted.

2015

Pre-trial settlement of unfair competition dispute in the United States

On March 20, 2015, it became known that Google was violating fair competition laws. The US authorities found the company guilty, but did not start a lawsuit against the corporation, since in early 2013 the parties agreed on a pre-trial ^[35].

The Department of the US Federal Commission to trade on investigating violations in the field of antitrust laws found Google guilty of violating fair competition laws, follows from a report compiled following an audit of the company's activities. Until now, it was classified, but inadvertently fell into the hands of the newspaper. Wall Street Journal

The report reports that the company Google illegally used data from rival websites, including Yelp, TripAdvisor and, Amazon to improve the efficiency of its own search engine, while imposing prohibitive measures against competing sites and advertisers.

Among the information borrowed from competitors are user ratings and reviews. When competitors demanded that Google stop doing this, the company responded by threatening them with exclusion from Google's search results.

The report, which is 160 pages long, said: Google's actions "have caused real harm to consumers and innovation in the Internet search market and the Internet advertising market," the WSJ quotes.

Thus, the report confirms that Google used its dominant position to fight competitors. Moreover, Google itself estimated its share of the Internet search market in the United States higher than independent analysts ~ 69-84% compared to 56%, according to ComScore.

"The threats of the corporation allowed it to achieve the desired effect of containing Yelp and TripAdvisor," follows from the document. "The company used its monopoly in the search market to benefit from the innovative technologies of its competitors."

It follows from the document - Google introduced prohibitive measures against competing search engines Microsoft Bing and Yahoo. The company did not allow advertisers to use statistics collected by its advertising platform on competitors' advertising platforms, the report said.

As a result of the investigation, the department leading it recommended that the FTC commissioners file a lawsuit against Google. However, in early 2013, the parties came to an agreement: the corporation voluntarily agreed to make adjustments to its behavior, and the commissioners unanimously voted to end the investigation. Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz explained then that the settlement agreement would benefit consumers more than if the US authorities began to prosecute the company.

Company Office in London, 2014

The WSJ wondered: Was the decision to end the investigation into Google political?! Google ranked second in terms of funds allocated to the presidential campaign of Barack Obama (Barack Obama) when he was re-elected for a second term. Top Google managers visited Obama's office two dozen times during his reign, the newspaper recalls. The commission in response to this said that their decision is completely independent.

In Europe, Google has been under investigation for several years. The Russian search engine Yandex filed a complaint against the American corporation with the Russian antimonopoly authorities. It said that Google prohibits manufacturers from installing Yandex applications on smartphones on the Android platform, and if they disagree, it threatens to exclude them from the ecosystem.

2014

The European Parliament proposes to divide Google into search and everything else

In November 2014, the European Parliament prepared a resolution that proposes the separation of Google Corporation. In particular, we are talking about "separating search engines from other commercial activities." As the Financial Times reported, such an initiative is seen by European politicians as another opportunity to reduce the influence of American Internet companies in the EU. In the text that the FT has, there is no direct indication of Google anywhere, but the dominant position of the American company in the EU, where it occupies 90% of the market share, suggests that the European Parliament's initiative is primarily directed against Google.

The European Parliament itself does not have the authority to pass any bills or to "divide" companies. Therefore, parliamentarians intend to send a resolution that does not have legal consequences to the European Commission. She is actively supported by the European People's Party and the Socialists. Thus, politicians want to influence the EU legislature in order to take action against Google. Even if the European Commission does not adopt the bill in this form, parliamentarians will be able to amend it later. They have already taken this opportunity to reduce the amount of bank bonuses to senior managers, and in 2010 the requirements for the amount of capital of European banks were increased.

The resolution is fully embedded in the long-term struggle that the EU is waging with Google. For four years now^[36] has been conducting an antitrust investigation into^[37] company^[38]Google is accused of displaying in search results primarily the addresses of those companies that are beneficial to it. The American corporation tried several times to resolve the investigation, but its proposals were rejected as insufficient by the European side (both the European Commission and market players).

In late November 2014, twelve members of the United States Congress signed a letter to members of the European Parliament expressing concern about the possible adoption by parliament of a resolution requiring the separation of Internet search services from other commercial services. The proposed resolution would be an impediment to innovation and investment by American internet companies, the letter said. International data flows will weaken, and millions of Europeans who use network services daily will suffer from this. Congressmen believe that healthy competition and equal conditions for American Internet companies and companies from other countries can be provided by traditional antitrust methods.

A similar letter was sent to the European Parliament by the chairman of the legal committee of the House of Representatives of the US Congress. The European Parliament does not have the powers it needs to force a company split, but the resolution it adopted could influence the European Commission's view.

A few days after the publication of the Financial Times, which reported on proposals to divide Google, the European Parliament officially announced the adoption of a corresponding resolution.

At the plenary session in Strasbourg, which took place on November 27, 2014, 384 parliamentarians approved the separation of the Google search engine from other commercial services of the American corporation. 174 deputies voted against this.^[39]

The European Parliament, which does not have the authority to divide companies, asks the European Commission to develop a proposal to separate Internet search services from other commercial services in order to "create a single digital space." This applies not only to Google, but also to other search engines operators such as Microsoft and Altaba (formerly Yahoo)

The European Parliament approved a resolution that could divide Google into parts

The final decision on this issue should be announced by the new European Commissioner for Antimonopoly Policy Margrethe Vestager. Her predecessor, Joaquin Almunia, has been conducting investigations against Google for several years as a result of complaints from competitors, including Microsoft.

Meanwhile, the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which includes Google, eBay, Facebook, Microsoft and Samsung, called the resolution adopted by parliament an "excessive and unsuitable" solution for a dynamically developing online market.

One of the authors of the draft resolution, Ramon Tremosa, wrote on his Twitter blog that the European Parliament is fighting to create a single digital market, which may need to separate search engines from the companies that own them.

Google was defended by the European Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society Gunther Oettinger. According to the official, he will not allow the separation of Google while it is in charge of the Internet economy of the region.

Europe introduces the right to oblivion

Main article: Right to oblivion

European regulators have repeatedly negatively expressed^[40] regarding Google's tax policy and data privacy policy. So, in May 2014, a court of the European Union ruled^[41]that Google is obliged to remove information about users' personal data from search results within the so-called right to oblivion. According to the report of the American corporation, in October the number of deleted links exceeded 500 thousand.

2012: Belgium, France and Germany demand Google pay extra to local media

This is not the first time European states have sought ways to convince Google of the need to share with them some of the astronomical advertising profits when issuing search queries. In October 2012, it came to a discussion, and in some countries, even the adoption, of completely absurd laws against the American corporation.

The Ministry of Innovation and the Digital Economy supported a bill in the fall of 2012, according to which Google is obliged to pay a certain premium to French media sites for the fact that links to articles of the latter are contained on pages with a selection of search results from Google. Google called this bill absurd and said that if the law is adopted, they will not issue links to the sites of the French media at all. Naturally, the latter are not satisfied with this alignment, however, no one knows how to proceed. The French government and some local media have already noted that threats in their direction do not solve the problem, and Google's refusal to cooperate is due to the fact that the company dominates this market. In neighboring Germany, since September 2012, a similar law has also been discussed, for the entry into force of which only the approval of the project by the country's parliament remains. And in Belgium, such a law has already been adopted, in connection with which Google refused to issue links to part of the Belgian media in search results.

Google is convinced that common sense is on their side. After all, the main service provided by the company is used by ordinary people to find information. The links that Google issues lead to materials that are initially freely available. Moreover, it is the ranking of these links in Google issues that brings new users to the websites of newspapers or magazines. Every month, up to 4 billion unique visitors to the Internet representative offices of the French media come from Google.

Notes