On Monday, France’s competition regulator fined Google 220 million euros ($267 million) after finding it had abused its dominant market position for placing online ads, as US tech giants face growing pressure in Europe.
The penalty is part of a settlement reached after three media groups — News Corp, French daily Le Figaro and Belgium’s Groupe Rossel — accused Google of effectively having a monopoly over ad sales for their websites and apps.
The competition authority determined that Google gave preferential treatment to its own ad inventory auction service AdX and to Doubleclick Ad Exchange, its real-time platform for letting clients choose and buy ads.
“It is the first ruling in the world to scrutinize the complex algorithmic processes for the auctions that determine online ‘display’ advertising,” the authority’s president Isabelle de Silva said.
