By Edith Hancock

Search engines and other groups have written to European Union authorities asking them to investigate Alphabet's Google over more concerns that the company could be violating the EU's digital competition law.

In a letter to the EU's top tech and antitrust enforcers, search engines, tech experts and advocacy groups said Google is flouting rules in the Digital Markets Act that force the world's largest technology companies to make it easier for users to switch to alternatives to their popular and dominant platforms and open those platforms up to rivals.

Google had to formally comply with the law in March 2024 and is expected to file an updated report on its compliance this week.

Under the DMA, Google must give rival search engines access to its ranking, query, click and view search data and present Android phone users with a choice screen when they upgrade or buy a device, allowing them to choose a default browser or search engine.

"Google both evades effective compliance and circumvents its obligations, continuously handicapping challengers' ability to compete," said the letter signed by Pennsylvania-headquartered DuckDuckGo and Czech web portal Seznam alongside campaign groups including Article19 and the Open Markets Institute.

A Google spokesperson said the company's search dataset for competitors complies with the DMA and it is in advanced talks to license that data to several rival search engines.

The tech giant said that DuckDuckGo is, in effect, asking it to violate user privacy and ignore legal obligations to get access to its search queries. It also said Google's choice screen design helps users make informed decisions about the search engine and browser they want to use.

"A choice screen cannot, and should not, force users to select a search engine that they don't want to use," the company said.

The letter--sent to EU competition chief Teresa Ribera and tech enforcer Henna Virkkunen--claims that Google doesn't provide fair terms for search data sharing. The group also said the search giant "fails to ensure that all Android devices in scope of the DMA and in circulation prior to March 2024 were shown search and browser choice screens, significantly muting the impact of the choice screen on Android."

Other barriers it said Google puts in place include not letting users switch defaults through a single, easily accessible setting, stopping alternative search apps from prompting users to change their defaults on Android devices and displaying so-called scare screens when users do try to switch their search defaults through a Chrome extension.

Michal Feix, external general counsel for the Czech app Seznam, said the company has seen "firsthand how Google's non-compliance with the DMA makes it nearly impossible to compete fairly."

"The Commission must act--fair market access is a legal right, not a privilege," he said.

The letter comes ahead of a key deadline for tech companies affected by the DMA. Those companies need to submit reports each year to show what they are doing to comply with the rules.

Amid criticism from companies that rely on Google's ubiquitous search engine to make money, Google has made several tweaks in the past year to how its engine runs in the EU following the initial compliance deadline.

EU officials are already investigating the company over what they say are suspected breaches of the law; one related to its search results display, and another to the business terms for developers distributing apps through its app store.

Write to Edith Hancock at edith.hancock@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 05, 2025 05:00 ET (10:00 GMT)

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