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As the world’s largest search engine, Google is often a target of Europe’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), which seeks to rein in Big Tech. The European Commission hit Google with a hefty 460 million euro ($543 million) fine in July for preferring its own services in searches for travel and shopping. Google has now made changes in accordance with the European Union’s wishes, but it claims the result is a massive reduction in search quality. If you don’t live in Europe and perform a search for, say, hotels, Google will helpfully provide myriad sponsored links, booking recommendations, and price-comparison tools in its results. The problem is that this content isn’t organic—Google includes links and offers contingent on its business interests. To get to the regular search results for these types of lucrative searches, you have to scroll way down the page. Companies that partner with Google can get more exposure, but the European Commission says this creates an unlevel playing field. “To comply with DMA requirements, we’re making significant changes to Search in Europe,” Google’s Nick Fox told Reuters. “These changes degrade the user experience for Europeans, boosting online intermediaries at the expense of local businesses and removing helpful features people rely on every day.” For Google users in Europe, features like instant pricing and availability for hotels and flights will be going away. Instead, these travel-oriented searches will produce a link to a specialized search engine at the top of the page, followed by two others with fewer details. Below that, Google will display a carousel of hotels, airlines, or restaurants without real-time pricing or availability. The ranking must be determined by Google’s search algorithm rather than its business interests.
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