The Competition Commission has launched a new thorough investigation into Google for suspected unfair revenue sharing conditions for news content.
According to the Competition Commission of India, the case would be combined with two other pending cases against the search engine giant in which the claims are substantially similar (CCI).
The ruling was issued in response to a complaint submitted by the News Broadcasters & Digital Association.
CCI authorised an investigation against Google in January of this year in response to a complaint presented by the Digital News Publishers Association. Later, the Indian Newspaper Society filed a similar lawsuit, which was combined with the first.
The regulator’s investigation arm, the Director General (DG), will now submit a combined inquiry report, according to a directive issued on Friday by the watchdog.
The News Broadcasters & Digital Association said that its members are obliged to supply their news material to Google in order for their weblinks to be prioritised in Google’s Search Engine Result Page (SERP). As a result, according to the complaint, Google profited from the members’ material without compensating them enough.
Among other things, it was claimed that Google took advantage of members’ reliance on Google’s search engine for referral traffic to establish services such as Google News, Google Discover, and Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP).
The search engine giant supplies users with news material via Google Search and the news aggregation vertical, Google News.
According to the lawsuit, users in Google Search can either search directly for news in the News Tab or receive news as a result in the SERPs. Google introduced news information into its SERPs via highlighted snippets and carousels of ‘Top Stories.’
However, the cash provided by Google to news publishers does not compensate for the true contribution made to these platforms by the association’s members, it noted.
CCI stated in a four-page ruling dated October 6 and issued on Friday that the claims are basically the same as those being investigated by the regulator.
The CCI has instructed the DG to integrate the investigations and produce a consolidated investigation report.
Cases where there is prima facie evidence of a breach of competition standards are referred to CCI’s investigation arm, DG, for a thorough examination.
Alphabet Inc, Google LLC, Google India Pvt Ltd, Google Ireland Ltd, and Google Asia Pacific Pte Ltd have all been named in the case. Members of the group include national and regional private news and current affairs broadcasters, as well as internet news media businesses.
