ANKARA

Turkish authorities on Wednesday fined Google 296 million Turkish liras ($36.6 million) for violating the country's competition law.

Turkey’s Competition Authority said Google violated the law by complicating organic search results in the content services market by prominently placing text ads at the top of its general search results, excluding its competitors.

The investigation included Turkish Google Reklamcilik ve Pazarlama Ltd., Google International LLC, Google LLC, Google Ireland Ltd., and Alphabet – Google’s parent company – it added.

In 2019, the European Commission also slapped a $1.69 billion fine on Google for breaking the EU’s anti-trust rules on online advertising.