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  • Hacker News
  • For Google this is just like parking tickets to UPS. A cost of doing business in town.
    by cmiles8
  • 'a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you're talking real money'

    ...but this is a private(ish) business, it doesn't have a printer in the back yard, a billion is a lot no matter how you look at it, especially if they're now facing a tough choice between cannibalizing their results with AI summaries or having AI competitors eating their lunch.

    by baq
  • Well it's 15% or their Q2 spending, to put things into perspective.
    by petre
  • I suggest that whenever Google get fined less than. $1B, they get an instructional booklet reminding them of how to count that low.
    by jchw
  • When fines became casual? Is it like taxes?
    by dlahoda
  • This fine is more of a warning shot. The DMA allows for fines of up to 10% of global revenue or 20% in the case of repeat offenders.

    These 890M are a first warning. Now Google has some time to react, but if they don't implement what is required of them, another, higher, fine will be issued.

    20% of global revenue is not just cost of doing business, to any business.

    by vrganj
  • well, Meta[0] is getting sued for a 1.4 Trillion$ by many US states combined if that interests you.

    [0]: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/meta-says-it-s-staring-...

    by Imustaskforhelp
  • The maximum fine the EU can impose with the DMA is "10 % of its total worldwide turnover in the preceding financial year". I think this would hurt even Google. And I think a billion dollars is not nothing.
    by BadBadJellyBean
  • this comment always comes up and it's _wrong_.

    The goal of the regulation is to get the operators to comply, which they usually do after fines (EDIT: and litigations and whining, of course), because the costs of infractions are increased if they don't comply.

    by riffraff
  • Interesting to see how Google solves this in their UI because this isn’t a new problem: In 2017, they were fined for a similar problem with Shopping and the auction house concept to compete for placement was heavily scrutinized.

    It’s all sort of intertwined now.

    by firesteelrain
  • EU source release: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_26_...
    by ChrisArchitect
  • It'd be great if they put the headline in terms of how many minutes of revenue this is.
    by cadamsdotcom
  • The lengthy legal battle against these fines is going to be extremely interesting, especially on the Shopping/Hotels/Flights side since it is an extremely competitive market. I wonder if the lower EU court will keep its overly proactive approach despite the CJEU's reversals.
    by timpera
  • where does the money from these fines go to? to the people affected or just gov coffers?
    by warrenmiller
  • Fines is for the government. Damages are for others (and sometimes govt).
    by victorbjorklund
  • Goverment coffers fund public works.
    by dmos62
  • These fines go toward the EU's general budget as "other income" which reduces the amount that member states must contribute annually for the budget to balance. So the EU partially funds itself by leveraging fines like this on AliExpress, Google, Meta, Apple, etc. and the trickle-down savings to member states is then (presumably) used to fund public works and social services locally.
    by petcat
  • At this point I assume Google is just budgeting for a $1B annual tax for operating in the EU.
    by granzymes
  • They figured out that part too
    by Muromec
  • Yeah, 1bil sound like a lot but it's about 0.2% of just their annual revenue. I don't think they're too worried tbh. Barely even a slap on the wrist.
    by Ae0lis
  • I hope these fines will fund NLNet.
    by maelito
  • Have you applied? What's your project?
    by inigyou
  • Article has no reference how exactly fine was reasoned to be specific amount. Nor specific examples of violations.
    by dlahoda
  • Presumably that’s covered by article 30 of the law: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj#art_30
    by robin_reala
  • I looked it up, and it seems that one issue is that Google, as a DMA gatekeeper, is supposed to provide anonymous data to other search services, but in practice, important parts of the actual data have been removed. The other issue is that competing AI services (not just Gemini) should also be allowed to run integrated app search.

    Reading about it, both points seem valid to me.

    by jdw64
  • Also apps need to be allowed to conduct their transactions outside the appstore and the appstore must allow them to advertise that.
    by BadBadJellyBean
  • The EU as a whole is walking a tightrope. Its largest economies still depend heavily on the US market. If the current US regime perceives that US companies are being targeted by EU "taxes", regardless of whether those laws are legitimate, there is a real danger of US retaliation.

    Key sectors could take the hit, including automotive manufacturing, industrial equipment, chemicals, electronics, fashion, textiles, and luxury food and wine.

    Given that these nations are already managing high debt loads while funding generous social welfare programs and expanding their defense budgets, trade sanctions could cause serious damage...

    So yeah...EU is performing a delicate balancing act here.

    by baridbelmedar
  • I think that's the point; much like how Canada isn't blinkimg every time the US jacks up whatever nonsense tariffs.

    They know it's going to hurt and they can't just order their own country -- or in the case of the EU; countries -- to fully decouple and so they're using the pain to encourage the creation and growth of alternatives.

    Nobody says it isn't painful or that it isn't going to suck but it's viewed as inevitable rather than something to be avoided.

    by lardosaurusrex
  • > there is a real danger of US retaliation

    This would make some sense under normal circumstances. However the Trump administration isn't "retaliating" except in the same sense you saw ICE "retaliating" by murdering unarmed protesters.

    Violent bullies respect strength to the extent they respect anything at all.

    by tialaramex
  • US tariffs on EU automotive manufacturing, industrial equipment, chemicals, electronics, fashion, textiles, and luxury food and wine, would be only slap on wrist.

    The real danger of US retaliation for EU are: export tariffs on US LNG, loosing arms exports for Ukraine. This the real EU delicate balancing act.

    by leonidasrup