Media

Google fined €250m by French watchdog in clash over news publishing

Move marks another escalation in France’s bid to get Google to deal with the media sector more fairly

The regulator said Wednesday that Google had failed to respect commitments to negotiate deals with press publishers in good faith. Picture: Getty

Alphabet’s Google has been fined €250 million by France’s competition watchdog for failing to broker agreements with media outlets for publishing links to their content and for plundering press content to train its AI technology.

The move from the French authority marks another escalation in its bid to get Google to deal with the media sector more fairly, after having previously slapped the US tech giant with a €500 million fine for similar abuses.

The ...