Google warned to change search results or face court over antitrust issues
Source: Guardian
European commission wants to address search engine company's dominance which it says could harm competition
Europe's antitrust chief has given Google until 2 July to offer changes in its search results and advertising rules or face the threat of going to court and potentially huge fines.
Joaquin Almunia, the head of competition policy, has written a private letter to Google in which he has set out the European commission's concerns on how Google's dominance where in Europe it has about 90% of searches could be harming competition.
But Almunia's letter is only one of many battles that the US company is fighting against the threat of government regulation. The US and Asia are also investigating whether it is abusing its near-monopoly in search, while in Europe, accusations that it is invading people's privacy and even snooping on online conversations are coming under scrutiny from French and German regulators.
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/jun/01/google-european-commission-search-results
GOTV
(3,759 posts)This doesn't seem anything like Microsoft using its desktop dominance to hurt competition in the browser market. Google has no mechanism by which they can coerce users to use their search engine over others. It has 90% market share because 90% of web searchers choose them. What could be easier to change than the search engine you use?
dipsydoodle
(42,239 posts)when you search any subject Google decides the order in which th search results show which can be biased.
If you do no more than google the letter f then see what happens.
BadgerKid
(4,554 posts)Productivity requires some level of organization.
2on2u
(1,843 posts)drone of course.
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/bits/2010/05/17/google-admits-street-view-wifi-sniffing/1
Google has found itself in the hot seat following the revelation that it captured vast quantities of private traffic from unencrypted routers during its Street View photography runs.
Following concerns raised by German authorities over the privacy implications of the data gathered by Google's Street View cars, the company wrote a blog post at the end of last month which aimed to reassure people that the information gathered was publicly available and of no threat - making specific reference to the fact that although WiFi network information including location, SSID, and MAC address is gathered "Google does not collect or store payload [network traffic] data."
GOTV
(3,759 posts)The 'market' for searches has to be understood, and we the consumer seem to understand it pretty well. Google's shown itself to be the most useful/efficient, and consequently dominates. What's a name of a google competitor? Can't think of one.
Woody Woodpecker
(562 posts)Also an antitrust issue.
onehandle
(51,122 posts)Quantess
(27,630 posts)I like Google best. Bing sucks. I used to use Yahoo ages ago, but they aren't that good anymore.
stonecutter357
(12,697 posts)dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)duckduckgo.com
ixquick.com
scroogle is supposed to be good, but half the time I can't complete the connection to it.
arikara
(5,562 posts)never use the google. It gets me where I want to go without ads and weird algorithms.
From Ixquick's privacy page: You have a right to privacy.
Your search data should never fall into the wrong hands.
The only real solution is quickly deleting your data or not storing them to begin with.
Since January 2009 we do not record our users' IP addresses anymore.
Your personal data are not shared with any third party.
We are the first and only search engine to do so.
Since then we have added many other features that protect your privacy.
Our initiative is receiving an overwhelmingly positive response!
https://www.ixquick.com/eng/protect-privacy.html
McCamy Taylor
(19,240 posts)elleng
(131,077 posts)Doubt the EU will build its own search!