{"id":96047,"date":"2020-10-23T17:00:59","date_gmt":"2020-10-23T14:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/"},"modified":"2020-10-23T17:00:59","modified_gmt":"2020-10-23T14:00:59","slug":"how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/","title":{"rendered":"#How to stop Google self-preferencing? Europe may not be the model"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_84 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a29bb17de6fb\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a29bb17de6fb\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/#Googles_solutions\" >Google\u2019s solutions<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/#Steering_traffic_to_itself\" >Steering traffic to itself<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/#A_historical_precedent\" >A historical precedent<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-4\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/#What_about_enforcement\" >What about enforcement?<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<p>&#8220;<strong>#How to stop Google self-preferencing? Europe may not be the model<\/strong>&#8221;<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>After a wide-ranging 16-month investigation, a congressional subcommittee examining dominance in the <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/technology\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"4\" title=\"Technology\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">technology<\/a> industry last week <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/judiciary.house.gov\/uploadedfiles\/competition_in_digital_markets.pdf\">recommended<\/a> more than two dozen updates to the U.S. antitrust system, including implementing nondiscrimination rules that would limit \u201cpreferential or discriminatory treatment\u201d by dominant platforms.<\/p>\n<p>But such rules can be hard to enforce, experts said, and attempts by the European Union to spur competition with Google through measures of this sort have fallen short.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re thrilled with the report. We think now the question is, What are they going to do about it?\u201d said Kamyl Bazbaz, vice president of communications at DuckDuckGo, a competing search engine. (Full disclosure: DuckDuckGo has <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/themarkup.org\/donors\">donated<\/a> to The Markup.)<\/p>\n<p>The week before the antitrust committee released its report, DuckDuckGo <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/spreadprivacy.com\/search-preference-menu-duckduckgo-elimination\/\">complained<\/a> that Google had shut it out as a potential default search engine for Android phones in most of Europe during a process meant to improve competition. That process was developed by Google in response to findings by the European Commission that Google had been abusing its dominance by requiring Android phone manufacturers to pre-install the Google search <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">app<\/a> and Chrome browser with Google set as the default search engine.<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Googles_solutions\"><\/span>Google\u2019s solutions<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Google <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/google-starts-appeal-against-eu-antitrust-decisions-11581516872\">appealed<\/a> the decision but also introduced a menu of four search providers that users can choose from when they set up their phones. Search providers had to bid to be included. Privacy-protecting DuckDuckGo lost the September auction in <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.android.com\/choicescreen-winners\/\">all but four countries<\/a>, and Ecosia, a nonprofit search engine that puts revenues toward planting trees, won a single spot.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is possible to do a good thing the wrong way, and that\u2019s what happened here,\u201d Bazbaz said.<\/p>\n<p>Similar complaints emerged last year, about Google\u2019s solution to level the playing field for comparison shopping sites.<\/p>\n<p>The European Commission had fined Google in 2017 for promoting Google Shopping at the top of search results while demoting competing shopping services. Google appealed the decision, which ordered the company to provide \u201cequal treatment\u201d to all shopping sites, including its own, but left the implementation up to the company. Google\u2019s solution was to auction off slots inside the Google Shopping unit.<\/p>\n<p>Two years later, 41 comparison shopping sites <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hausfeld.com\/uploads\/documents\/Final_Version_Joint_Letter_of_CSS_to_Ms_Vestager_on_Google_Shopping-Non-Compliance_26.11.2019.pdf\">wrote an open letter<\/a> saying that Google\u2019s solution does not amount to equal treatment and has failed to restore competition. Even Margrethe Vestager, the EU commissioner for competition, <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=QGvj12gd3UU\">acknowledged<\/a> that \u201cwe still do not see much traffic for rival competitors.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this year, Google told The Markup that it \u201cinvested in making the remedy as effective as possible\u201d in the Google Shopping case and that 600 comparison shopping sites are participating. When asked about DuckDuckGo\u2019s allegations, spokesperson Julie Tarallo McAlister pointed to Google\u2019s <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.blog.google\/around-the-globe\/google-europe\/update-android-search-providers-europe\/\">blog post<\/a> explaining the auction.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn developing the choice screen for Europe, we carefully balanced providing users with yet more choice while ensuring that we can continue to invest in developing and maintaining the open-source Android platform for the long-term,\u201d she said in an email. \u201cThe goal is to give all search providers equal opportunity to bid; not to give certain rivals special treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Steering_traffic_to_itself\"><\/span>Steering traffic to itself<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>The subcommittee found multiple instances of harmful self-preferencing by the dominant platforms, including evidence that Google systematically steers traffic to itself \u201ceven when its content was inferior or less relevant for users.\u201d The <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/judiciary.house.gov\/uploadedfiles\/competition_in_digital_markets.pdf\">report<\/a> also cited a Markup investigation that found that Google devotes <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/themarkup.org\/google-the-giant\/2020\/07\/28\/google-search-results-prioritize-google-products-over-competitors\">41 percent<\/a> of the first page of search results on mobile devices to its own properties and information copied from other sources, sometimes without their knowledge or consent.<\/p>\n<p>Google declined to comment on the subcommittee report and directed The Markup to an <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.google\/outreach-initiatives\/public-policy\/statement-democratic-and-republican-house-antitrust-subcommittee-reports\/\">online statement<\/a> that said the findings \u201cfeature outdated and inaccurate allegations from commercial rivals about Search and other services.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the nondiscrimination rules, the committee\u2019s recommendations included breaking up the dominant firms; prohibiting them from operating in certain lines of business; unwinding past acquisitions and raising the standards for approving new ones; and eliminating obstacles to private antitrust lawsuits.<\/p>\n<p>Most of the recommendations would depend on Congress passing new laws or amendments, but the principles could be implemented by regulatory agencies. \u201cWe intend these recommendations to serve as a complement to vigorous antitrust enforcement,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n<p>A <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/buck.house.gov\/sites\/buck.house.gov\/files\/wysiwyg_uploaded\/Buck%20Report.pdf\">response<\/a> to the report, authored by the subcommittee\u2019s Republican minority members, pushed back against some of the recommendations, including nondiscrimination rules.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnfortunately, calling for the government to write the rules governing equal terms for equal service will only increase harmful regulations on small and medium-sized tech firms while reducing capital and innovation in the marketplace,\u201d they wrote.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI support the idea that monopolies need to provide 3rd parties access to their platforms on the same terms as their own products,\u201d Chris Cummings, CEO of the company that owns translation website SpanishDict.com, said in an email. He has been frustrated to see Google Translate at the top of many translation searches, reducing his traffic considerably in those searches in favor of what he says is an inferior, automated product. \u201cFor the upstarts of our society to have any chance of prevailing, it needs to be a fair fight.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Joe Saveri, an antitrust attorney based in Silicon Valley who has brought cases against Google, said implementing nondiscrimination rules to prevent self-preferencing is one of the more practical of the antitrust committee report\u2019s recommendations.<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"A_historical_precedent\"><\/span>A historical precedent<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Such rules would require \u201cequal terms for equal service,\u201d meaning any company that relies on a dominant platform to reach customers should have the same access. In other words, SpanishDict and Google Translate would have equal opportunity to appear at the top of Google search results.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s got historical precedent, which is a positive,\u201d Saveri said. Nondiscrimination rules were famously applied to railroads and telecommunications networks.<\/p>\n<p>Even after nondiscrimination rules are implemented\u2014if indeed they are\u2014lawyers would still have to argue about what constitutes unequal treatment and how to remedy it.<\/p>\n<p>The Sherman Anti-Trust Act\u2014the backbone of U.S. antitrust law\u2014would require proving not only that self-preferencing was happening but that it was also increasing monopoly power in a specific market, said Eleanor Fox, a professor at New York University who has been working in antitrust for 40 years and was asked to submit recommendations to the subcommittee. She said it would be difficult to establish that Google\u2019s placing its products in the search results is illegal self-preferencing under current law.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s also difficult to show harm to consumers, which has become the standard in the courts. \u201cGoogle will say, \u2018Well, just scroll down a little bit. The consumer still has lots of choices,\u2019 \u201d she said. \u201cGoogle will also say the consumer already gets things for free and is paying zero.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Still, both she and Saveri said remedies could be designed to ensure, for example, that Google doesn\u2019t boost its own interests in search results.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI do not think it would be so hard,\u201d Fox said.<\/p>\n<p>Saveri said potential remedies could tweak the inputs in the search algorithm, require the company to add disclosures about why certain results appear at the top, or set out how much of the screen could be covered by Google content.<\/p>\n<p>There are plenty of other recommendations for how Google Search could change, both from critics, like Yelp (which has <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/FocusOnTheUserLocal\/FocusOnTheUserLocal\">released code<\/a> that would show competing directories at the top of the search results page), and official sources, like the U.K. Competition and Markets Authority, which in July <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/assets.publishing.service.gov.uk\/media\/5efc57ed3a6f4023d242ed56\/Final_report_1_July_2020_.pdf\">recommended<\/a> making Google\u2019s user \u201cclick and query\u201d data available to other search engines.<\/p>\n<p>Gene Kimmelman, a former chief counsel with the U.S. Department of Justice\u2019s Antitrust Division who testified before the committee, <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.publicknowledge.org\/blog\/the-right-way-to-regulate-digital-platforms\/\">wrote that<\/a> it can be complicated to distinguish between products competing on a platform and features of that platform.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor example, an app store may be an essential part of a smartphone operating system, so preferencing the operating system\u2019s own app store by having it pre-loaded on the phone may not be appropriately understood as \u2018discrimination,\u2019 \u201d he wrote. \u201cOn the other hand, a grocery store is probably not an inseparable part of an e-commerce platform, so preferencing Whole Foods over a competing grocery retailer on the Amazon Marketplace might be a good example of discrimination that would be subject to the rule.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"What_about_enforcement\"><\/span>What about enforcement?<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Fox, of NYU, also recommends another solution: strengthening the antitrust authority of the Federal Trade Commission, which is charged with regulating \u201cunfair methods of competition.\u201d In 2012, FTC staff <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/graphics.wsj.com\/google-ftc-report\/\">found<\/a> that \u201cGoogle\u2019s conduct has resulted\u2014and will result\u2014in real harm to consumers and to innovation in online search and advertising markets,\u201d but the commission voted unanimously against filing a case.<\/p>\n<p>The antitrust subcommittee report concluded that the FTC has \u201cneglected\u201d its role in antitrust enforcement and recommended ways that Congress could beef up the agency, including increasing its budget and adding civil penalties for unfair methods of competition.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Federal Trade Commission actually has more power,\u201d Fox said, \u201cif they want to use it.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr\/>\n<p><em><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/themarkup.org\/google-the-giant\/2020\/10\/15\/big-tech-antitrust-google-nondiscrimination-enforcement\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Originally published on themarkup.org\" class=\" lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org\/static\/img\/republish-logo.png\" data-lazy=\"true\"\/><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>This article was <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/themarkup.org\/google-the-giant\/2020\/10\/15\/big-tech-antitrust-google-nondiscrimination-enforcement\">originally published on The Markup<\/a>\u00a0by Adrianne Jeffries and was republished under the <a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/4.0\/\">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives<\/a><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\"> license.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">For forums sites go to <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/forum.buradabiliyorum.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more like this article, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/technology\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Technology category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/thenextweb.com\/syndication\/2020\/10\/23\/how-to-stop-google-self-preferencing-europe-may-not-be-the-model\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;#How to stop Google self-preferencing? Europe may not be the model&#8221; After a wide-ranging 16-month investigation, a congressional subcommittee examining dominance in the technology industry last week recommended more than two dozen updates to the U.S. antitrust system, including implementing nondiscrimination rules that would limit \u201cpreferential or discriminatory treatment\u201d by dominant platforms. But such rules&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":96048,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/img-cdn.tnwcdn.com\/image\/tnw?filter_last=1&fit=1280,640&url=https:\/\/cdn0.tnwcdn.com\/wp-content\/blogs.dir\/1\/files\/2020\/10\/image-9-2.png&signature=5df6b55ce21e726e205665605fd32391","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[75363,26293,73157,76912,33355,70759],"class_list":["post-96047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-european-commission","tag-google","tag-investigation","tag-search-engine","tag-silicon-valley","tag-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96047\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}