The European Commission has launched an antitrust investigation into Alphabet Inc.'s Google's use of content from online publishers and YouTube videos to train its artificial intelligence models. The city of Brussels suspects that the US giant has failed to fairly compensate content creators and not give them the option to opt out of having their data used. These actions may constitute an abuse of our dominant position in the search services market.
The study specifically focuses on AI Overview, an AI-generated overview that appears at the top of search results in more than 100 countries. It has been rolling out since May and includes sponsored content. The initiative aims to ensure fair competition and protect the rights of publishers, journalists and other creators in the emerging artificial intelligence market, said Teresa Rivera, vice chair of the commission.
The proceedings follow a complaint filed by an independent publisher in July. This comes amid increased scrutiny of the practices of major digital platforms, as evidenced by a separate investigation recently launched against Meta over its AI plans at WhatsApp. If a violation is confirmed, Google could be fined up to 10% of its annual global revenue.
