Australia takes on Google advertising dominance in latest Big Tech fight
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[January 28, 2021] By
Byron Kaye
SYDNEY (Reuters) - An Australian regulator
is considering letting internet users choose what personal data
companies like Google share with advertisers, as part of the country's
attempts to shatter the dominance of tech titans.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) also proposed
limiting the internet giants' ability to access users' online histories
to cross-sell products.
The proposals were part of the ACCC's interim report into digital
advertising in Australia, a A$3.4 billion ($2.6 billion) market the
regulator said is marked by a lack of competition, transparency and
choice.
The ACCC estimates Google's share of Australian digital advertising
revenue at between 50% and 100%, depending on the service.
"Google is the only one that can determine the effectiveness of ads, so
really often they're marking their own homework when it comes to the
effectiveness of the ads they supply," ACCC chair Rod Sims told Reuters
in a telephone interview.
"There's a lot wrong with the market ... and it's effectively dominated
by one player," he added.
The proposals add a new element to the antitrust regulator's campaign to
check the power of online behemoths Google and Facebook Inc in
Australia.
Proposals by the ACCC that Google pay local media for content that
drives traffic to their websites have been adopted in draft legislation
by the government. Google has criticised the planned News Media
Bargaining Code, threatening to pull its search engine from Australia if
they go ahead.
In Thursday's 222-page digital advertising report, the regulator also
suggested a system under which users' personal data would be shared more
widely with advertisers, on an anonymised basis, to foster more
competition.
Allowing internet users to choose to give other parties access to their
clicking data may also promote competition among online advertising
suppliers, the ACCC said.
Preventing tech companies from using data collected in one scenario to
sell advertising in an unrelated field would also reduce the ability of
a single player to dominate the digital ad market, the report added.
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Smartphone with google
app icon is seen in front of the displayed Australian flag in this
illustration taken, January 22, 2021. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File
Photo
The regulator is accepting submissions for the next month ahead of a final
report due in August. The government will then decide whether to make its
recommendations law.
A Google spokesman said the company's advertising service "helps businesses
connect with customers and publishers reach new audiences, creating new growth
and revenue opportunities for them".
A Facebook representative said the company was reviewing the report, without
commenting further.
Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg noted the ACCC's "concerns over
competitiveness and the continued dominance of tech giants" but did not say
whether he supported the proposals.
SEARCH EXIT
Sims said he was not surprised by Google's threat to pull its search platform if
the media laws went ahead.
"If you want to come up with good public policy on these issues you're bound to
be getting companies to do things they don't want to do," he said.
Hannah Marshall, a partner at Marque Lawyers who specialises in competition law
and media, told Reuters she expected Google and Facebook to start withdrawing
services if the law went ahead.
"While this requirement to pay to link to news content remains in the code, I
don't think that there's going to be a resolution that works," she said.
"If enacted in its current form, Google and Facebook are likely to make good on
their threats and that will kind of start a chain reaction of bad consequences
for a lot of people in Australia, not only the news publishers."
(Reporting by Byron Kaye with additional reporting by Jill Gralow; Editing by
Aurora Ellis and Jane Wardell)
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