CCI Orders to Investigate Google Alleging Unfair Business Practices with Reference to Google Pay
November 09,2020
On Monday, Competition Commission of India (CCI) — the watchdog for anti- competitive practices in country has ordered an investigation against Google, alleging the search giant abusing its dominant position in the market and providing unfair privilege to GooglePay- its digital payments entity.
The complainant had made six allegations against Google out of which the CCI has ordered to investigate two of the counts. These two include- making GooglePay a default app installed in Android smart phones & giving it prominence on Google Pay, and Google’s policy regarding the mode of Payment for the purchase & In-app-purchases (IAPS).
The case includes some of the important allegations made by Indian startups against Google a few months back. If Google is held responsible by CCI, it can put an impact on Google’s policies around PlayStore in India and can benefit various Indian startups which have been against the Playstore’s commission policies.
While the complaint centers on GooglePay, the probe has been announced against five entities — Alphabet Inc, Google LLC, Google Ireland Ltd, Google India Pvt Ltd and Google India Digital Services Pvt Ltd. This is one of the three anti-trust cases before CCI against Google. Earlier in 2018, Google was fined by CCI over abusing the dominance in search Engine as well.
