By Joshua Jones | Posted 4 hours ago According to Deadline, a fine of approximately $4.18 billion has been imposed by the European Court of Justice on Google. The report notes that the court ruled that the tech giant imposed “unlawful restrictions on Android mobile device manufacturers” and operators when it came to “consolidating” its search engine position. The fine is reportedly less than that recommended by the Commission and the European Court of Justice. In the original 2018 case, the Commission accused Google of illegally forcing device manufacturers to install its search engine app and Chrome browser. The condition was supposed to be the licensing of its Play Store. They previously made payments to major manufacturers and carriers on the condition that they agreed to exclusively pre-install their app and prevented manufacturers from pre-installing previous versions of Android. Google, however, argued that the payments and agreements kept Android a free operating system. The company criticized EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager, who reportedly led the case against other tech giants. Google’s owner, Alphabet, already lost a challenge to a billion-dollar fine last year. The billion-dollar fine for Google comes as many of its services are seeing significant recovery. Deadline reported in July that the YouTube TV service surpassed 5 million subscribers after launching five years ago. As noted in the report, the figure makes YouTube TV the fifth largest TV distributor in the US Google has also recently changed its approach to TV and streaming. Two years ago, they decided to merge Chromecast and Android TV into a $50 brand offering. Chromecast, with Google TV, is compatible with more than 6,500 apps on the Android TV operating system. Whether this billion dollar fine hurts Google remains to be seen. The company has been at the center of controversy for years, most notably with its YouTube service. Many top creators on YouTube have criticized the company for its lack of communication and playing favorites. Google has also been accused of sniffing out rivals and failing to crack down on fake news. In 2018, the Commission found that the company’s measures of political advertising were not specific enough. Google did not say whether measures were taken to combat fake news. In terms of their relationship with other countries, Google has been accused of censoring China as well. The Intercept reported in 2018 that Google was planning to launch a censored search engine. The app reportedly allowed the “blacklisting of sensitive questions” and terms related to human rights, democracy, religion and more. According to The Intercept, documents obtained revealed that Google’s Chinese search app was “automatically identifying and filtering” websites blocked by the country’s so-called Great Firewall. Google’s original search engine for China launched in 2006, but was pulled from the mainland in 2010. The Intercept reported that the company suspended development of another search engine for the country after complaints from the company’s own privacy team. Only time will tell if Google’s reported strong-arm tactics will continue to plague the company’s public image. For now, the company has a lot of explaining to do.
