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Despite the strong criticism from large technology companies and U.S. tech elites against European technology and artificial intelligence (AI) regulations, the European Commission shows no sign of easing its focus on competition issues. Recently, the European Commission has officially launched an investigation to determine whether Google has violated European competition laws. The core of this investigation is to review how Google's AI Overviews and AI Models functions use website content.
The European Commission is focusing on Google's method of using website content without the permission of website owners to generate AI summary answers displayed at the top of search results, as well as how it creates answers based on YouTube videos. In a statement, the Commission said that the investigation will examine whether Google uses the content of network publications in AI Overviews without proper compensation, leaving publishers with little opportunity to refuse the use of their content without losing Google's search access.
Europe emphasizes that Google's dominance over vast network traffic leaves content creators with few choices and may affect video uploads on YouTube. Additionally, the investigation will consider whether Google undermines competition in the AI market by acquiring website content and imposing "unfair terms and conditions," as well as whether it worsens competitive barriers by not allowing other AI companies to use YouTube content to train their own AI models.
This investigation is taking place as more AI models and content companies face lawsuits from publishers and websites over copyright infringement. For example, AI search tools like Perplexity have been sued by multiple media outlets, including the New York Times. However, the European investigation is different. It aims to provide a fair competitive environment for AI companies competing with Google. According to reports, Google is accused of gaining an unfair competitive advantage by utilizing a broader range of internet resources due to its extensive network coverage compared to competitors.