Alphabet-owned Google said on Sunday it had removed several browser extensions from IAC / Interactive Corp, an online joint venture, for “policy violations” and was reviewing “enforcement options”. “We are in constant dialogue with the IAC regarding the policies of the Chrome Web Store, and we have already removed several extensions that violate our policies,” a Google spokesman said in an email to Reuters.
“We are reviewing the remaining extensions and our enforcement options and have not made any decision regarding the IAC’s position in the store,” the statement added. The Wall Street Journal previously reported that Google would decide whether to impose heavy fines on the IAC for its “deceptive marketing practices”.
The report added that Google had misled users about its browser extensions and that the alphabet unit could go as far as banning its products from its Chrome browser. In a statement to Reuters, Google’s spokesman did not specify what precise policies the IAC had violated or what appropriate options it was considering. An IAC spokesman denied that the extensions violated Google’s policies. “Google has taken hundreds of millions of dollars from us to promote and distribute these products in the Chrome Store,” he told Reuters in an email statement.
“There is nothing new here – Google has used their position to reduce our browser business to the last small corner of the Internet, which they are now trying to cancel,” the report added. Google investigators say the WSJ cites sources and documentation that IIC’s browser extensions often guarantee functions that users are not provided with and move users toward additional ads.
Google has not yet acted on the IAC on the internal recommendation of its Chrome Confidence and Security Committee because both categories of competitors and Google executives are concerned that fines could be considered anti-competitive, the newspaper said. .com / 2JZcHf1.
An IAC spokesman said Google had approved its extensions to the Chrome Store for several years as part of a joint venture agreement between the companies.
“Google has significant control over what we do with these products,” he said in the statement.
