In the legal dispute over a billion-dollar fine for violations of European competition law, Internet giant Google must expect another setback. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) should confirm the €2.4 billion fine imposed by the Commission, recommended ECJ Attorney General Juliane Kokott in her opinion on Tuesday.
The Advocate General's recommendations are not binding, but are considered to guide the Court's decision. Google “exploited its dominant position in the general search services market to promote its own comparison shopping service,” the attorney general said. The company put its own service at the top of search results and demoted competitors' comparison portals. This means that Google is violating European competition law.
The European Commission imposed the fine in 2017 after a seven-year investigation and complaints from comparison portals. Google appealed to the Court against Brussels' decision and, in the first instance, the European Union's court of first instance (EuG) confirmed the sentence. The ECJ's final decision is expected within a few months.