IP Law Daily, TECHNOLOGY/INTERNET NEWS: European Commission probes Google’s search rankings of third-party content on news sites, (Nov 14, 2025)

By Steven Melendez

The Commission is investigating whether the policy violates the Digital Markets Act, while Google defended it as a necessary anti-spam measure.

The European Commission is investigating whether a Google policy demoting third-party commercial content on publisher websites “applies fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory conditions of access” as required under the Digital Markets Act. The investigation could lead to fines as high as 10% of the company’s “total worldwide turnover,” or 20% in the case of repeated violations, according to a November 12 news release. That could mean a multibillion-euro fine for Google over a practice the company defended in a blog post as essential to fighting spam and scams.

“Today we are taking action to ensure that digital gatekeepers do not unfairly restrict businesses that rely on them from promoting their own products and services,” said Teresa Ribera, the European Commission’s executive vice president for clean, just and competitive transition. “We are concerned that Google’s policies do not allow news publishers to be treated in a fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory manner in its search results. We will investigate to ensure that news publishers are not losing out on important revenues at a difficult time for the industry, and to ensure Google complies with the Digital Markets Act.”

In September, the EU issued Google a 2.95 billion euro, or roughly $3.5 billion, antitrust fine for favoring its own digital advertising service over those of competitors. That drew the ire of President Donald Trump, and the new move could also antagonize the U.S. administration, according to the press reports.

Google, in a blog post by Pandu Nayak, the company’s chief scientist for search, defended the policy as a measure against tactics where media outlets and other publishers are paid to run content for third-parties, who benefit from a website’s existing good ranking within Google results.

“For example, a scammy payday loan site might pay a respected website to publish its content, including links to its offerings,” Nayak wrote. “We consider this to be spam, because both our users and our systems think they’re dealing with a trusted website, when in reality they’re dealing with a scammer. This practice comes in many flavors, but the essence is always the same: a pay-to-play scheme designed to fool our ranking systems and users.”

Google’s current practice has been in place since May 2024, according to the blog post. Nayak argued that it, in fact, helps even the playing field between websites, so those using “deceptive tactics” can’t outrank those with superior content not paying to run that material on a high-ranking website.

“Unfortunately, the investigation announced today into our anti-spam efforts is misguided and risks harming millions of European users,” wrote Nayak. “And the investigation is without merit: a German court has already dismissed a similar claim, ruling that our anti-spam policy was valid, reasonable, and applied consistently.”

But German media company ActMeraki complained to the European Commission about Google’s policy, saying it penalizes publishers, who have also complained the rule was rolled out with little transparency, according to a report from TechPolicy.Press. The Association of Online Publishers, a trade organization, has also warned that it’s unclear how content written by freelancers is treated under the policy.

The Commission said it will aim to finish its investigation into the practice within 12 months.

News: TechnologyInternet