Google to allow Android users in Europe choose default search engine

 

FILE PHOTO: The Google logo is pictured at the entrance to the Google offices in London, Britain January 18, 2019. REUTERS/Hannah McKay/File Photo

 

(Reuters) - Google will let Android device users in Europe choose their default search engine from four options, including Google search, the U.S. company said, as it tries to quash EU antitrust concerns and stave off fresh penalties.

 

New Android smartphones and tablets shipped in the European Economic Area (EEA) will host a 'choice screen' displaying four search engines that users can select from, beginning early 2020, Alphabet Inc's (GOOGL.O) Google said in a blog post. (bit.ly/2yuIiwh)

 

Search engine providers will be allowed to bid in an auction to win a spot on the users’ screens, along with Google, to become the device’s default search engine on the Android home screen as well as the Chrome browser.

 

The auctions will be conducted in each EEA country and the three highest bidders for a given country will appear on the ‘choice screen’, the U.S. tech company said.

 

Google’s move follows the European Commission’s decision last year to fine the tech giant 4.34 billion euros ($4.81 billion) for blocking rivals on its Android mobile operating system.

 

The European Commission said Google had an unfair advantage by pre-installing its Chrome browser and Google search app on Android smartphones and notebooks.

 

Google has since allowed Android users in Europe to choose rival browsers and search engines from five options.

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2019-08-02

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The Google search engine is a joke, programmed to produce distorted "politically-correct" answers - which sometimes can be downright hilarious.

 

If you don't believe me, try doing a Google images search for "white couples".

 

The results will raise your eyebrows and a hopefully few obvious questions.

 

Now try accessing images of "black couples".

 

Spot the difference?

 

No? Then search for "all-white couples" - surely a foolproof way to screen out out any non-Caucasians who may have slipped through the net.

 

Or so you might have imagined.

 

To get such misleading and obviously deliberately manipulated results from an Internet giant with a 92 percent share of the search engine market is worrying, to say the least.

 

But are the tiddler alternatives any better? Using my alternative DuckDuckGo search box, the results came up virtually the same.

 

This is not good enough. The job of search engine providers is to provide accurate, unbiased information, not doctored data designed to influence the way we think or feel on "sensitive"  issues.

 

If they won't do this voluntary, then they must to be brought to heel by regulation. 

On 8/3/2019 at 2:31 PM, Krataiboy said:

The Google search engine is a joke, programmed to produce distorted "politically-correct" answers - which sometimes can be downright hilarious.

 

If you don't believe me, try doing a Google images search for "white couples".

 

The results will raise your eyebrows and a hopefully few obvious questions.

 

Now try accessing images of "black couples".

 

Spot the difference?

 

No? Then search for "all-white couples" - surely a foolproof way to screen out out any non-Caucasians who may have slipped through the net.

 

Or so you might have imagined.

 

To get such misleading and obviously deliberately manipulated results from an Internet giant with a 92 percent share of the search engine market is worrying, to say the least.

 

But are the tiddler alternatives any better? Using my alternative DuckDuckGo search box, the results came up virtually the same.

 

This is not good enough. The job of search engine providers is to provide accurate, unbiased information, not doctored data designed to influence the way we think or feel on "sensitive"  issues.

 

If they won't do this voluntary, then they must to be brought to heel by regulation. 

Its a good point well put.

i dont think the seach engines should be allowed to do what they do anyway.

They crawl everyones site, take a copy of all your website even if it has copyrighted data/images on it then index it without your permission then make money selling the info.