In a blog post,, external Google’s vice president of regulatory affairs, Lee-Anne Mulholland, said the recommendations constitute “government overreach” and could result in higher prices for consumers.
Ms Mulholland admits Google makes its Chrome browser and Android operating system free because they are gateways to “help people access the web and use our products.”
She warns that if they were to be separated from Google, they would have to start making money in their own right – which would lead to increased prices.
Ms Mulholland also argues that by paying companies such as Apple and Samsung billions of dollars a year to be the default search engine on their devices, they effectively subsidise those products.
Therefore, if they stopped paying, the prices of those products would go up, she says.
Google also contends that the online advertising market is competitive, citing a Wall Street Journal article, external which says that more people are turning to TikTok and Amazon to search instead.
However, the same article says that Google still has more than 50% of the ad search market.
source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62504lv00do
