€890 million fine for Google, Google's invisible wall!
The internet should be an open playing field, but for anyone who has followed the news in recent years it is clear: the referee has his hands full with one particular player. Google has again been fined by the European Commission, for a total of €890 million, for serious breaches of the Digital Markets Act (DMA).
At Pixelunion we believe in an open digital ecosystem. But the facts show that Google often acts like a lord in a system of ‘digital feudalism’ rather than a neutral service provider.
What exactly happened?
The European Commission found that Google abused its power on two fronts:
- Self-preferencing in search results: Google placed its own services (such as Google Shopping and flights) prominently at the top, while competitors were pushed down. This resulted in a fine of €460 million.
- Anti-steering on Google Play: Developers were not allowed to inform consumers about cheaper options outside the Play Store. That added another fine of €430 million.
This is not an incident. It is a pattern. The tech giant has previously received record fines totalling billions of euros for practices around AdSense and Android.
From shopping to photos: a dangerous comparison
You may wonder: what does an antitrust case about hotel bookings have to do with storing my photos at Google? Everything.
The principle of ‘self-preferencing’ (favouring your own services) can be applied to images just as easily. Imagine a world in which Google’s own stock photography or AI-generated images always take priority in search results over the independent portfolios of photographers. If Google decides that its own ‘Google Photos’ ecosystem or Gemini AI should be the standard, alternative platforms and individual creators are simply made invisible.
The risk is that we as creators are no longer “owners” of our digital presence, but merely “tenants” on Google’s land.
Why Google cannot be trusted
The sources paint a picture of a company with a “pathological pursuit of profit and power”. Although it often promises to do better with slogans like “do the right thing”, the repeated violations show that fines of hundreds of millions are for them merely a “cost of doing business”.
On top of that, Google uses aggressive lobbying tactics (spending more than €30 million a year in Brussels alone) to weaken legislation that is meant to protect consumers and small businesses.
Conclusion: protect your independence
The recent EU Court ruling confirms what many already feared: Google uses illegal practices to limit consumer choice. If we do not look critically at how these gatekeepers govern our digital world, we lose control over how our own work is found and shared.
At Pixelunion we keep fighting for a transparent market.