European Parliament ups pressure on EU to break up Google
MEPs voted 458 to 173 a historic decision in favor of breaking up the Google Inc. Of course the resolution does not mention Google by name, yet it is widely understood to be the target.
The non-binding resolution asks the EU commission to unbundle search engines from other commercial services as a means to tackle market dominance of the Internet giant that is said to have over a 90 percent of the market share in Europe.
The parliament’s vote is seen as the strong message of discontent with Google in Europe, where the company is also facing an ongoing four year probe by the European Commission into its market dominance.
Google is investigated for squeezing out rivals and abusing its pole position to distort search results by ensuring that links to its own products and services come top. Earlier Google has suggested a series of concessions, but all have been rejected. If the dispute continues, Google could face a fine of up to $5 billion and a regulation of the dominant online web search could be envisaged.