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Antitrust complaint against Google
Context:
As India is discussing an exhausting digital competition law, the Alliance of Digital India Foundation (ADIF) has filed an antitrust complaint with the Competition Commission of India (CCI) against Google.
ADIF seeks to promote, assist, and support startups by taking up policy-related issues, and create a level playing field for startups and innovators. The primary focus of ADIF is to bring innovation and technology spearheaded by Indian startups to the centre stage.
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- The complaint is against Google’s alleged anti-competitive practices in the online advertising market.
Recently, a US District Court has also found Google guilty of monopolistic practices in search and text advertising, disrupting its longstanding dominance and is coinciding with India’s new digital competition law discussions.
- ADIF contends that Google derives 97 per cent of its revenue from advertising, which led to practices that stifle competition and adversely affect Indian businesses.
- ADIF is particularly concerned over Google’s Privacy Sandbox initiative which could significantly hamper non-Google Demand Side Platforms’ ability to serve advertisers effectively.
- Privacy Sandbox initiative aims to remove third-party cookies from websites accessed via the Google Chrome browser.
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The Competition Commission of India (CCI) Established in March 2009, it is a statutory body responsible for enforcing the Competition Act, 2002. The CCI’s main goal is to promote and sustain fair competition in the Indian economy. The Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Act, 1969 (MRTP Act) was repealed and replaced by the Competition Act, 2002, on the recommendations of the Raghavan committee. |
India’s Draft Digital Competition Law:
- Inspired by the European regulatory handbook, India has proposed a new digital competition law.
- It could stop tech giants like Google, Facebook, and Amazon from self-preferencing their own services, or using data gathered from one company to benefit another group company.
- The Digital Competition Bill, 2024 has provisions to set presumptive norms to curb anti-competitive practices before they actually take place.
- It promises to impose heavy penalties for violations which could require big tech companies to make fundamental changes to their various platforms.
- The Bill proposes to designate Associate Digital Enterprises (ADEs) so that the data collected by one company of a major technology group can benefit others as well.
- If an entity of a group is determined to be an associate entity, they would have the same obligations as
Systemically Significant Digital Enterprises (SSDEs).
- SSDEs have a significant presence in any given core digital service and are identified on the basis of parameters like their turnover, market influence, etc.
- But the draft law is not supported equally and there are various firms opposing “ex-ante” regulations in digital competition law.
- Ex-ante regulation refers to rules that look at preemptively preventing large platforms from engaging in certain types of conduct that could result in reducing competition.
