Google hit with record fine by EU, told to change its ways

After a seven-year legal battle, European authorities came down hard on Google on Tuesday for taking advantage of its dominance in online searches to direct customers to its own businesses, fining the tech giant a record $2.72 billion and raising the prospect of more.

A years-long analysis of Google’s online search results showed that the company lists links to its own online shopping services above those of rivals, European regulators said. On average, Google lists search results to its biggest rivals in online shopping only on page 4 — and smaller rivals even lower. That’s a huge advantage for Google when 90 percent of use clicks are on page one.

“What Google has done is illegal under EU antitrust rules. It denied other companies the chance to compete on the merits and to innovate. And most importantly, it denied European consumers a genuine choice of services,” EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said.