Google faces EU scrutiny
February 25, 2010 |13:29 | Gossips By : Team X
European Union antitrust regulators are looking into complaints filed by three online companies against Google that may lead to a formal investigation into the search-engine giant's business practices. The European Commission, tasked with ensuring that companies do not abuse any dominant position in the 27-country EU, can fine firms up to 10 per cent of their revenues for violations. The commission's decade-long antitrust battle with Microsoft cost the software company at least euros 1.67 billion in fines.
One key result will be seen next month when European users are automatically offered a choice of browsers to replace Microsoft Internet Explorer.Commission officials emphasized Wednesday that its inquiry was at an early stage and that they were awaiting replies to a letter issued in the first week of February.
Julia Holtz, senior competition counsel for Google, described the EU case as being at "a very preliminary stage." "I don't think that this will necessarily turn into a real antitrust investigation; we haven't really done anything wrong." World No.1 search engine Google said earlier that British price comparison site Foundem and French legal search engine ejustice.fr had alleged that its search algorithm demoted their sites in web search results.
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