EU fines Google $5B for illegal practices via Android

By Gokhan Ergocun

ANKARA

The European Commission on Wednesday imposed a €4.34 billion ($5.06 billion) fine on Google for breaching the EU’s antitrust rules through Android.

For the last seven years Google has imposed illegal restrictions on device manufacturers and GSM operators who use its operating system -- Android -- to strengthen the dominance of its position in the search engine market, the commission said in a statement.

The commission added: "Google must now bring the conduct effectively to an end within 90 days or face penalty payments of up to 5 percent of the average daily worldwide turnover of Alphabet, Google's parent company."

Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said that the Google case includes three types of restrictions to provide traffic to its search engine from Android devices.

"In this way, Google has used Android as a vehicle to cement the dominance of its search engine," she stressed.

She said company policies have blocked rivals and denied a chance to innovation.

"They have denied European consumers the benefits of effective competition in the important mobile sphere. This is illegal under EU antitrust rules," Vestager added.

The commission said Google stipulates manufacturers must pre-install its search and browser applications to get the app store licenses, and it also made payments to manufacturers and GSM operators to pre-install its applications on devices.

"And [it] has prevented manufacturers wishing to pre-install Google apps from selling even a single smart mobile device running on alternative versions of Android that were not approved by Google," the commission highlighted.

The Android mobile operating system, used by 80 percent of all smart mobile devices worldwide, was bought by Google in 2005.