PARIS: French regulators said Wednesday they were fining Google 250 million euros (272 million dollars) for breaching commitments on paying media outlets for reproducing their content online and using their material for its AI chatbot without telling them.
Google and other online platforms have been accused of earning billions from news without sharing the revenue with those who produce it.
To tackle this problem, the European Union created a form of copyright in 2019 called “neighboring rights” that allows print media to demand compensation for using their content.
Strategy of Google and Facebook
France has been a test case for the rules and regulations and after initial resistance, Facebook and Google both agreed to pay some French media for articles shown in web searches, AFP reported.
Organizations representing French newspapers and magazines — as well as Agence France-Presse (AFP) — had filed a case with France’s Competition Authority in 2019.
Two years later, the watchdog fined Google five hundred million euros for failing to negotiate in good faith.
In 2022, the authority accepted commitments from Google to talk fairly with news organizations.
Under the deal, the US tech giant has to provide newsgroups with a transparent offer of payment within 3 months of receiving a copyright complaint.
But the regulator said on Wednesday that it was imposing the new fine on Google for “failing to respect commitments made in 2022” and not talking in “good faith” with news publishers.
