Google: EU court upholds €2.4 billion fine, UK Supreme Court blocks billion-pound lawsuit
An EU court found the search engine company had breached competition rules, but a UK court ruled in favour of the search giant on a separate case
The European Union's second-highest court has dismissed Google's appeal of a €2.4 billion (about £2 billion) antitrust fine, issued for demoting rival shopping services on its search engine.
In its ruling [pdf], the EU's General Court, in Luxembourg, said the search engine company had breached competition rules and deserved the fine the the European Commission handed to it in 2017.
The judges backed the Commission's finding that Google should not favour its own shopping service over competitors. However, their ruling was more limited than the initial conclusions: while the regulator was largely correct in its decision, the judges said it had failed to prove that Google had harmed the market for general search, leaving its decision solely targeting the shopping-search service.
The EU's executive branch launched the probe against Google in 2010, following multiple complaints from US and European competitors.
After several years of questions, the Commission assigned the €2.4 billion fine in 2017, saying Google had systematically given prominent placement to its own shopping service in searches and demoted those of rivals.
"What Google has done is illegal under EU antitrust rules. It denied other companies the chance to compete on the merits and to innovate. And most importantly, it denied European consumers a genuine choice of services and the full benefits of innovation," European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said at the time.
The regulator gave Google 90 days to stop favouring its own shopping service or face an additional penalty per day of up to 5 per cent of Alphabet's average daily global turnover.
It was the first of three antitrust penalties, totalling over €8 billion (about £6.8 billion), that the Commission has hit Google with in recent years.
Following the decision, the Google amended the way its shopping services worked but appealed the penalty.
The firm argued its data showed internet users preferred links taking them directly to products they want and not to sites where they have to repeat their search.
"Our approach has worked successfully for more than three years, generating billions of clicks for more than 700 comparison shopping services," Google said.
Last year, Google told EU judges that the fine penalises innovation.
"If Google would have faced the commission's decision in 2008, Google would have had no other option but to abandon its innovative technologies and its improved designs," lawyer Thomas Graf told a panel of judges.
However, the EU General Court rejected the appeal on Wednesday.
The ruling could be challenged again if Google decides to approach the European Court of Justice, the EU's highest court, for a final verdict.
The ruling is a major win for EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager and will bolster the bloc's crackdown on the increasing power of technology giants.
UK blocks billion-pound lawsuit
Meanwhile, the UK Supreme Court - also on Wednesday - blocked a planned £3.2 billion class action suit against Google over the unlawful tracking of millions of iPhone users.
In the hotly-anticipated judgment, the Supreme Court judges unanimously dismissed the legal action brought by former Which? consumer group director Richard Lloyd on behalf of 4.4 million people in England and Wales.
Lloyd alleged that the internet giant had secretly tracked internet browsing histories for iPhone users between 2011 and 2012 by bypassing default privacy settings on the Safari browser.
The collected data included race, social class, political leanings, sexuality and shopping habits, as well as health information, which was allegedly used for commercial purposes.
The lawsuit aimed to make the search giant pay a compensation bill of £3.2 billion, an estimated £750 per person.
However, the Supreme Court, presided over by Lord Robert Reed, on Wednesday ruled in favour of Google, in what commentators said was a "significant win" for the company.
In a statement, Google said the claim was related to events that occurred a decade ago and were addressed at the time.
Jonathan McDonald, partner at Charles Russell Speechlys, said, "Google, along with the wider technology sector, will be relieved by today's ruling."
"This morning's judgment was gearing up to be an incredibly important case in the context of data protection, privacy and information law litigation.
"However, Google and countless other businesses - including many who use cookies on their websites without a full understanding of the cookie rules - will be relieved with the court's finding that a claim founded on the data protection legislation's provisions providing for the payment of compensation (or 'damages') to individuals, requires a claimant to have suffered monetary loss or actual distress.
"The provisions do not require compensation to be paid where data has simply been processed or used in contravention of the law," he added.