European antitrust regulators still aren’t done looking into Google’s practices. The European Commission told Reuters in a statement that it’s conducting a “preliminary investigation” into Google’s data collection. While it didn’t go into detail, a leaked document indicated that the focuses were on local search, ads including ad targeting, sign-in services and web browsers, among “others.” It’s covering the core of Google’s businesses, to put it another way.
An investigation doesn’t necessarily guarantee the EU will file an antitrust case. However, officials have previously slapped Google with over €8 billion about $8.8 billion in fines over allegations of restrictive ad contracts, anti-competitive Android policies and similar claims. It wouldn’t be shocking if the Commission found issues with Google’s data gathering methods, especially when national regulators have already fined Go
