Brazil shelves anti-competitive conduct suit against Google

Brazil’s antitrust Administrative Council for Economic Defense (Cade) shelved an anti-competitive conduct lawsuit against Google. The technology giant had been accused of copying content from competitors and using it in its search engine. The council was unable to corroborate the allegations.

Google runs the most popular online search engine, in addition to controlling video platform YouTube, operational system Android, and web browser Chrome. All of these rank first in their segments, also in Brazil.

In the lawsuit, company E-commerce Media Group Informação e Tecnologia, which runs web portals Buscapé and Bondfaro, accused Google of copying their product details and reviews on Google Shopping.

Cade went through the search results shown from 2011 and 2016 and declared it could not find material data demonstrating unauthorized content was being displayed.

Google released a note saying, “We are glad our products and services are in compliance with the Brazilian law and we will continue to collaborate with the council.”

New probe

Despite rejecting the accusation, Cade’s court requested an inquiry into abuse of economic power by Google in the search engine and news markets, where one of the council members declared signs of anti-competitive practices could be found.

According to consulting firm Statista, Google controls 97.5 percent of the search engine market, followed by Bing (1.1%) and Yahoo (1.16%).