Has Google gotten so intertwined in all of our personal information, and so threatening, even to rivals like Microsoft, that the only thing that can tame it is government?
Two articles we have posted within the last 24 hours suggest that one way or another, the bell is tolling for Google in Europe.
In the first from Germany’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung, columnist Thorsten Riedl writes in part:
“Google has shown that it’s more concerned with what is technically feasible than with the privacy of its customers. … A lot of information is too important to surrender to a single company. Unfortunately, Google’s rivals are faltering. Faced with this, it is only right that politics should step in.”
Then, in an editorial from Spain’s ABC headlined, ‘E.U. Antitrust Probe May Result in ‘Banning’ Google, yet another legal decision in Europe looks serious enough to get Google corporate’s attention:
As part of its anti-trust policy, the E.U. has opened an investigation into certain practices of the company Google, at the request of three firms [based in the E.U.] who claim that Google’s search processes are discriminatory, as are its methods for placing advertisements. Google controls 80 percent of all searches in Europe, so any company penalized by the search engine suffers an objective loss of position in the market. [Microsoft has since admitted ‘having a hand’ in the probe. ]
It makes sense that Brussels would intervene to preserve open competition. That has been a substantial element of the European “common market” since the very beginning of integration, which has now been reinforced by the Lisbon Treaty. This transparent process may end with a declaration of incompatibility and a ban in order to hinder the restriction or distortion of competition.
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