EU vs. Big Tech: What actions have regulators taken so far?

"On December 9, the European Commission opened a formal antitrust investigation into Google's use of online content to train its artificial intelligence (AI) models and produce overviews on search results pages. The EU's executive branch raised concerns that Google was scraping content from web publishers without appropriate compensation and without giving them an option to opt out. Many websites rely on advertising revenue to operate and depend on the number of page clicks generated through search engines such as Google."

"The probe will also look into whether Google used video content from YouTube to train its generative-AI models without compensating creators or allowing them to opt out. "Google does not remunerate YouTube content creators for their content, nor does [it] allow [sic] them to upload their content on YouTube without allowing Google to use such data," the Commission wrote in a statement. If proven, these actions could breach EU competition rules preventing "abuse of a dominant position"."

European regulators are intensifying enforcement of new digital laws such as the AI Act, Digital Services Act, and Digital Markets Act to constrain major technology companies and protect consumers. The EU has targeted firms including Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, and Microsoft with stepped-up enforcement this year. On December 9, the European Commission opened a formal antitrust probe into Google's use of online content to train AI models and generate search overviews, citing scraping of publishers' material without compensation or opt-out options. The probe also examines whether YouTube content was used to train generative-AI systems without compensating creators. If proven, the practices could violate competition rules against abuse of dominance.

Read at euronews