Google fined $593 mn by French antitrust agency over news content issue

Google ignored a 2020 decision to negotiate in good faith for displaying snippets of articles on its Google News service

Google was fined 500 million euros ($593 million) in France after the search giant failed to follow an order to thrash out a fair deal with publishers to use their news content on its platform.

The Alphabet Inc. unit ignored a 2020 decision to negotiate in good faith for displaying snippets of articles on its Google News service, the Autorité de la concurrence said Tuesday. The fine is the second-biggest antitrust penalty in France for a single company.

France isn’t alone in trying to hold tech giants to account over their use of news. Australia earlier this year required digital