\n<\/p>\n
Google faces enforced changes to its UK search business after the competition watchdog conferred a special status on the company that puts it under tighter regulation.<\/p>\n
The Competition and Market Authority (CMA) confirmed that Google has \u201cstrategic market status\u201d (SMS) in search and search advertising, a term that means the company has such market power that it requires a special regulatory regime.<\/p>\n
The watchdog now has the power under new digital laws to order changes to how Google operates in those areas. Friday\u2019s announcement is the first time it has designated a tech firm with SMS.<\/p>\n
It has already flagged a number of potential changes including giving internet users an option to choose a different search service via \u201cchoice screens\u201d. One option for the screens could be to include AI-powered rivals in the search space, such as Perplexity and ChatGPT.<\/p>\n
The CMA has also proposed ensuring fair ranking of search results and providing more control for publishers over how their content is used, including in AI-generated responses. Google\u2019s artificial intelligence-powered AI overview and AI mode features are also included under the SMS designation.<\/p>\n
The CMA said its decision was not a finding of wrongdoing and would not result in immediate action. However, it will begin a consultation on potential changes to Google\u2019s business this year.<\/p>\n
Will Hayter, the executive director for digital markets at the CMA, said promoting competition in areas such as search and search advertising \u2013 where advertisers pay to place an advert in a user\u2019s search result \u2013 can unlock opportunities for businesses and drive investment across the UK economy.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have found that Google maintains a strategic position in the search and search advertising sector, with more than 90% of searches in the UK taking place on its platform,\u201d he said. \u201cHaving taken into account the feedback received following our proposed decision, we have today designated Google\u2019s search services with strategic market status.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oliver Bethell, the senior director for competition at Google, said the move could endanger UK users\u2019 access to new products and services.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany of the ideas for interventions that have been raised in this process would inhibit UK innovation and growth, potentially slowing product launches at a time of profound AI-based innovation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
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Sign up to Business Today<\/span><\/p>\n Get set for the working day \u2013 we’ll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Tom Smith, a competition lawyer at Geradin Partners and former CMA legal director, said there is a strong case for taking on Google.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is a very well-established case for removing some of the market distortions caused by Google\u2019s monopoly position. The US and the EU are already doing this. Today\u2019s decision means that the CMA now has the legal ability to follow suit,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n In a separate investigation, the CMA is deciding whether Apple and Google\u2019s mobile phone platforms should be designated as having SMS under the new digital regulatory regime, which was brought in under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Google faces enforced changes to its UK search business after the competition watchdog conferred a special status on the company that puts it under tighter regulation. The Competition and Market Authority (CMA) confirmed that Google has \u201cstrategic market status\u201d (SMS) in search and search advertising, a term that means the company has such market power<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27506,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[270,2628,2016,2018,1017,5339,2019],"class_list":{"0":"post-27505","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-change","9":"tag-force","10":"tag-google","11":"tag-search","12":"tag-special","13":"tag-status","14":"tag-watchdog"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}