Paris – France has imposed a fine of 500 million Euros on Google, the leading company in the information technology sector. Isabelle de Silva, the President of the French Competition Authority, informed that this is the biggest action taken by the authority for violation of the copyright act of the European Union. Google has expressed strong displeasure over the decision. This becomes the fourth big action taken by France against Google.
The Competition Authority informed that the action was taken after the failure of negotiations to use the French media content. While imposing the fine, an order has also been issued that the media companies should propose compensation for the use of French media content. If the companies failed to present such a proposal, Google would have to pay an additional fine of 0.9 million Euros per day.
The content prepared by the media appears in the Google search engine. Based on this content, Google earns a huge online advertising revenue. But the content creator media companies do not receive their legitimate revenue share. Although the European Union has made a law regarding digital copyrights, Google did not properly implement the provisions of the law. Agence France-Presse, the leading news agency in France, had registered a complaint with the Competition Authority. While giving the verdict on this complaint, a fine of 500 million Euros has been imposed on Google.
Only last month, a French agency had imposed a fine of 220 million Euros on Google. The French Competition Authority had said that the penalty was imposed as Google misused its market domination in ‘online ads’ posted on the internet. Before this, France has made Google pay a fine of nearly 1.15 billion Euros in various matters. Google had accepted its faults and had agreed to pay the fine. But Google has expressed displeasure over the new action and has reacted that the decision is very disappointing.
For the last few years, issues of income, profits, tax evasion and market domination by the big-tech companies are consistently coming on the anvil. Along with the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia and Australia, even the European countries have started adopting an aggressive stand in the matter. Legal actions in various forms have been initiated against these big-tech companies in many countries, and fines and other punishments have been handed over in specific issues.
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