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Google Faces Up To $5 Billion Fine From Competition Commission of India
An anonymous reader writes "Google is facing investigation by the Competition Commission of India and potentially faces fines up to 10% of its three-year average turnover. While Google has settled anti-trust cases in the U.S. and the European Union, India's competition regime does not have provisions for settlement process." From the Times of India article linked: "The complaint against Google, also one of the world's most valued company, was first filed by advocacy group CUTS International way back in late 2011. Later, matrimonial website matrimony.com also filed a complaint. Referring to Google's settlement with the European Commission, matrimony.com counsel Ferida Satarawala said: 'Google's unfair use of trademarks as well as its retaliatory conduct are not specifically addressed in the European settlement and are distinct theories of harm being pursued by the CCI. Therefore, this settlement is unlikely to address CCI's concerns in our case.'"
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Seems like theft to me.
Google has lots of money, let's fine Google.
It seems like yet another shakedown of a big company by the corrupt Indian gov't. Nothing to see here...
Is it me or is Anti-Trust a thing you seem to have once a company reaches a certain size and age?
I read the entire fine article, and I'm still at a loss. What was the specific harm which the Indian government is trying to correct?
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
This looks like a case of shopping for a favorable legal venue to me:
http://www.cuts-ccier.org/Media_CCI_search_against_Google_US_Federal_Trade_Commission_supplies_new_inputs.htm
It is difficult to see what specifically Indian interests are at stake here.
Such cases should be resolved through civil litigation, not anti-trust litigation halfway around the world.
Whether the Indian act provides for settlement or not is not relevant; the commission can negotiate with Google before deciding what penalties to impose. Seems to me Google always has the option of stopping to do business in India while still serving up search results for free.
Google can just pull out, refuse any ads from any company based in India. Its time for Google to start using the power they have.
Lets see how long it takes for the Indiana government's mind to change.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
In general that is true. Sometimes its legit, but often times its not and just a tactic to squeeze the companies. Rarely does a true monopoly that is abusing its power get nailed. They have the money and influence to prevent that.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
"India's competition regime does not have provisions for settlement process"
more like
"India's competition regime does not have provisions for settlement process written into the law"
There does seem to be a private method for making agreements between companies and gov't officials that is the accepted practice in India.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
One of the worst spamming sites there is. I've received their junk "newsletters" despite never visited it before.
Now couple what you've just seen with the idea that governments worldwide actively consider taking money from businesses operated in other countries to be even better than taxing successful businesses in their own country.
Throw in one last thought - the Indian government is answerable to the Indian people. Do you really think they'll be pissed off to hear that they've successfully strongarmed billions out of some foreign entity?
I wish that were the case. More likely that India would seek to get the US government to make more H1-b visas available. It's one of the charming things about the Indian government. They do things that benefit their constituent population. Sound familiar?
India would demand that the United States honor international law and force Google to forfeit the demanded resources to satisfy their debt. Whether the United States government would choose to comply is another question, one which would almost certainly be decided by a US court.
By this point, India's legal system would almost certainly have frozen or seized any Google assets located in India; and since Google's trademark and technologies would be among the resources seized . . . there is a tremendous opportunity here to fracture and shatter the internet, once and for all. The (re)Balkanization of the web would almost certainly follow, if this course of events proceeds in the way I've described here.
To close, the course of events I've described can only result from what I consider to be an extremely unlikely act on Google's part - attempting to correct a legal/political situation via technological means (withdrawl of technical services to al Indian-based entities? Think about it). I find it more likely that Google will contest this in an Indian court, with what I consider to be a good chance of prevailing. Even if they lose, Google is not going to go the "cut off my nose to spite my face" route, they're going to comply (after exhausting all other lawful options) and try to find a way to recoup their losses within the laws of the countries they're doing business in.
Blacklist, I think it's called?
Just to get the cart back behind the horse - let's see if the Indian judicial system can work this out correctly. There seems to be an assumption here that India's judicial system is little better than a star-chamber mechanism dispensing kangaroo-court justice. While I'll admit there may be strong political and financial incentives for an Indian court to arbitrarily find Google liable, there's no reason to believe that the Indian courts will fail to correctly perform their function of interpreting and adjudicating Indian law.
And these companies provide good jobs to Indian citizens. However once you start fining them the cost advantage of operating in India evaporates.
Google is generally considered to be the most desirable employer in India.
Uh, two wrongs don't make a right. Three lefts do.
It's simple: if you want to operate in India, you must follow Indian law. If you are not willing to do that, your company will be fined, just as it did in Europe.
Sure..if we are talking about laws regarding your operations in India. Any attempt to impose extra-territorial legal restrictions is always very questionable. Generally, there has to be a compelling humanitarian reason for legislating extra-territorial behavior (like outlawing human trafficking or sex tourism to countries with under-age prostitution) or an attempt to stop international criminal behavior (like drug-trafficking or maybe... maybe tax dodging). Improper application of IP laws (like patent laws)? If that were ok, then, as a poster above mentioned, US would go after bank accounts of any company producing generic versions of US drugs before they became off-patent in the US. Unless, of course, they want to claim that this is 10% of Google's operations in India, but I doubt Google does $50 billion worth of business in India.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
What if India was simply paid off by Bing to accomplish just such a goal? Simply running away is not an option if you conduct a business in which there are competitors. If you base a society on such principles, you end up with a society in which there is no rule of law -- whoever pays the highest bribe wins. You can argue that we are already there, and to some degree, you'd be right. But these are matters of degree and if Bing were to in India in such a way, that would be another step in the direction of lawlessness.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Humanity faces a five hundred million billon trillion dollar loss of income due to premature extinction of the species.
There's no reason to believe that if you haven't paid attention to their previous bullshit.
Use of the words "good", "bad" or "evil" is almost invariably the result of oversimplification.
"The US FTC has told the Indian competition watchdog that Google is using its superior technology to push out competitors from the GPS tracking market."
So it's superior technology that is the problem ?
Aren't you supposed to develop technology to compete or has that idea gone in favour of suing the people you can't beat ?
Of course, the cynical, which is to say, vastly overwhelming historical norm, there and in Europe, wherein regulation is meme pap to get useful idiots on your side while the real reason is to get kickbacks for the politicians, continues apace.
Keep arguing in the memespace; it's working as intended.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I was going to write exactly the same thing as the comment above.
A bunch of pissants in a country like India that think that they can shake down Google for f-ing $5 BILLION dollars are living in the the 20th century when power was defined by being a country with a flag, a UN seat, an airline, and a president-for-life.
Things are different now.
Especially for a country like India, which is run by corrupt IIT graduates who live on delusions of being a super-power with a moon base and don't have a clue about how to deal with having 500 million people living in abject poverty around them.
Just turn off Google in India, then when the people complain about it being missing, Google can say "If we turn it on, no lawsuits, no penalties of any kind."
Honestly though, why doesn't the Indian government go after these obvious wallet chasers - all they want is to steal money from Google since they couldn't earn it for themselves.
They don't deserve to get a penny, and really should do time for the attempted robbery.
Google is less than 50% of all searches and the ONLY search company that spends its own dime to fight NSA requests. But I can tell that you're trolling, which means you have a very good chance of a mental disorder, so I can't hold that against you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Haven't gotten any of the scam calls that are from indian call centers requesting you install remote sessions for them to "assess your virus infections" yet have you ? These for some reason are still allowed to run there from the same scum trying to get cash out of google there.
This package Does Not Contain a Winner
Should have to experience a 10 year embargo of those services. Same with countries that threaten companies that for instance make patented drugs. Ok you want to kill the golden goose you go right ahead. Live w.o. Google or cancer drugs for 10 years. France tries this shit all the time but at least they admit it's a mugging.
The one I mean is the "fucking off position"
now - GO
Ya gotta love all these fucking countries all over the world shaking down American tech companies. All these people should go back to fucking goats for a living and leave the smart stuff up to the smart people...
Paul E. Bahre