According to reports, the Independent Publishers Alliance has filed an antitrust complaint with the European Commission, accusing Google of abusing web content in its search results to generate AI summaries. The complaint states that Google's AI summaries have caused significant harm to news publishers, including a decline in traffic, audience, and revenue.
The complaint emphasizes that unless publishers choose to completely disappear from Google search results, they "cannot opt out of having their materials used in AI summaries." This issue has clearly attracted the attention of many publishers, as their visibility on Google directly affects website traffic and profitability.
Since Google began adding AI-generated summaries at the top of some web search results over a year ago, this feature has continued to expand. Although the quality of certain answers was extremely poor in the initial stage, the scope of its use has continued to grow, leading to significant drops in traffic for many news publishers.
In response to questions from reporters, Google stated: "The new search AI experience allows people to ask more questions, creating new opportunities for content and business discovery." At the same time, Google pointed out that claims about web traffic often rely on incomplete data, and fluctuations in website traffic may be caused by multiple factors.
As AI technology develops, Google's search engine continues to try new ways to enhance user experience. However, for publishers that rely on search engine traffic, such changes may mean greater challenges. The filing of the antitrust complaint reflects the concerns of the publishing industry about their survival and their protest against the behavior of large platforms.
Key Points:
📄 The Independent Publishers Alliance submitted an antitrust complaint to the European Commission, accusing Google of abusing content to generate AI summaries.
📉 Google's AI summaries have led to a significant drop in traffic and revenue for news publishers.
🤖 Google argues that the new AI search experience creates opportunities for content and business discovery, and traffic changes may be caused by various factors.