Turkey's Competition Board has again fined Alphabet Inc's Google, this time to a tune of more than 296 million Turkish ($36.65 million), for allegedly abusing its dominant position in the search engine services, reported Reuters and Daily Sabah. This is the third time since 2018 that Google has been fined by the country's regulatory body. The Turkish competition authority — Rekamet Kurumu (RK) — found that Google had favoured its own accommodation price comparison service and local services over those of competitors. According to an auto-translated copy of the order, the regulator has asked Google to rework its services to enable competition within six months so that competitors are no longer at a disadvantage. Google also has to report compliance to the regulator every year for the next five years. Google, according to statement quoted by Reuters, offered a rebuttal, claiming that is search services were designed to give consumers more choices, and hence boost competition. "We will evaluate the decision (of the board) and continue working with the Competition Authority by maintaining our usual constructive approach," Google said. Not Turkey's first tussle with Google This is not the first time that Turkey's competition regulator has taken on Silicon Valley tech giants. In 2017, it had opened its first investigation into the company following a complaint by competitor Yandex. In September 2018, the regulator issued a fine of 98 million Turkish lira for violating fair competition law by prioritising certain vendors over others. Following that, Google made changes to its…
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