Turkey versus Google: The Next Wave of Antitrust Regulations

By Sara Imam

If I am on the market for a new coffee machine, and I type in “best coffee machine” to the search bar of Google, I will be met with a rolodex of advertisements on the top of the page for every coffee machine available on the market from various websites. I would consider those advertisements to be part of my standard online browsing experience. Not in Turkey. In April 2021, the Turkish government issued a $36.6 million fine on Google for breaching the country’s competition laws.[1]

The Turkish Competition Authority (the “TCA”) is the governmental organization that seeks to prevent monopolization, increase consumer welfare, and contribute to the country’s economic development.[2] The TCA is Turkey’s national competition agency tasked with implementing and enforcing the Turkish competition law framework, as outlined by Law No. 4054 on the Protection of Competition and by article 167(1) of the Constitution of Turkey, which mandates the state to “take measures to ensure and promote the sound and orderly functioning of the money, credit, capital, goods, and services markets” and “prevent the formation, in practice or by agreement, of monopolies and cartels in the markets.”[3]

Google was fined for allegedly abusing its dominant position in the general search services market, to highlight its local search and accommodation price comparison services to the exclusion of its competitors.[4] Plainly, when a consumer typed in search terms into Google, they were met with paid advertisements from websites promoting the products they searched for. Google had abused its dominant market position to suppress competitors from appearing in consumers search results. Google responded that its search services were designed to effectively meet consumer demand for information, and that offering more travel and accommodation options actually boosted competition.[5]

After the investigation into Google’s practices, the TCA found that Google violated Article 6 of Law No. 4054 on the Protection of Competition, and an administrative fine was imposed.[6] Along with the fine, the TCA also demanded that Google must ensure within six months that competitors are no longer disadvantaged, and it must report to the TCA every year for the next five years about the issue.[7]

Tensions between Turkey and Google are not new, but this is simply another development on the issue. In November 2020, the TCA fined Google with 196.7 million Lira for breaching Turkey’s competition laws.[8] At the time, Google was fined for placing ads at the top of the search results, consequently affecting natural search results. Google also has a sordid history with the President of Turkey, Tayyip Erdogan. Erdogan had blocked access to Google’s platform, YouTube, first in 2007 for three years and again in 2014.[9] These regulations could lead to serious implications, namely, whether we consider this a win for consumers, or another step towards censorship? To understand where these regulations lead, we do not have to look farther than Turkey’s neighbors.

Google’s anti-competition practices are not specific to Turkey, in fact they are well documented. In 2020, the United States Justice Department, along with eleven state Attorney Generals, filed a lawsuit to stop Google from unlawfully maintaining monopolies through anticompetitive and exclusionary practices in the search advertising markets and was forced to remedy the competitive harms.[10] This lawsuit cites Google paying Apple billions of dollars to be the default browser for Safari as an example of anti-competitive practices.[11]

Predating Turkey’s newer regulations, Google was fined by France’s antitrust agency for the same type of conduct. France’s antitrust agency targeted Google’s control over the digital ad market, wherein Google owns the majority of the online ad market and has dominance over what search results appear to consumers.[12] As a result of the French probe, Google has pledged to “make sure competing platforms serving publishers can properly access the Google server for advertisers and allow the rivals compete fairly with Google to buy publishers’ ad space,” and to “make changes to allow publishers using rival ad servers to access Google’s Ad-X in real time.”[13] In addition to these proactive changes, Google settled with the French probe by agreeing to pay 220 Million Euros in fines.[14]

Turkey may not have been viewed as having highly regulated commerce laws, but the companies hoping to operate there have to abide by their laws. The actions taken by Turkey attempt to protect competition. By virtue of typing in the search box, a consumer would hope to be getting results tailored to what they are looking for-as opposed to only seeing results that were paid advertisements. As the global animosity towards the tech industry grows, we find ourselves entering the next phase of heightened antitrust and competition laws.

[1] Adam Satariano & Daisuke Wakabayashi, Why Turkey’s Regulators Became Such a Problem for Google, New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/29/technology/google-turkey-regulators.html (July 29, 2021).

[2] Turkish Competition Authority, Rekabet Kurumu https://www.rekabet.gov.tr/en/Sayfa/About-us/turkish-competition-authority

[3] Law on the Protection of Competition Turk., Act No. 4054, adopted July 12, 1994; Turk. Const. art. 167(1).

[4] Satariano & Daisuke, supra note 1.

[5] Ali Kucukgocmen, Turkey fines Google for abusing dominant position, Reuters https://www.reuters.com/technology/turkey-fines-google-abusing-dominant-position-2021-04-14/ (Apr. 14, 2021).

[6] Id.

[7] Id.

[8] Satariano & Daisuke, supra note 1.

[9] Turkey blocks YouTube amid ‘national security’ concerns, The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/27/google-youtube-ban-turkey-erdogan (Mar. 28, 2014).

[10] Department of Justice, press release https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-monopolist-google-violating-antitrust-laws (Oct. 20, 2020).

[11] Id.

[12] Gaspard Sebag & Aoife White, Google Overhauls Global Ad Model After French Antitrust Fine, Bloomberg, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-07/google-fined-268-million-as-france-tackles-big-tech-ad-power (June 7, 2021).

[13] Id.

[14] Id.