Alphabet's Google has proposed changes to its spam policy that has been criticized by publishers, a move that could help it avoid EU antitrust fines, European Commission documents show. Previously, publishers complained about Google's "website reputation abuse policy", resulting in the US technology giant becoming the target of an investigation by EU regulators.
This policy is designed to combat the practice of publishing third-party pages on a website in an attempt to use ranking signals from the main site to manipulate search rankings, a practice often referred to as "parasitic SEO."
That prompted the European Commission, the bloc's competition enforcement agency, to launch an investigation in November under the Digital Markets Act, which aims to curb the power of tech giants.
The document stated that Google has proposed modifications to the plan to comply with the requirements of the Digital Market Law and has given relevant parties until next week to submit feedback.
The EU watchdog said its monitoring showed that when the websites of news outlets and other publishers contained content from commercial partners, Google's spam policies lowered the ranking of these websites and their content in Google search results.
The regulator noted that the policy directly affects a common and legal way for publishers to monetize their sites and content.
Violations of the Digital Markets Act can result in companies facing fines of up to 10% of their global annual turnover.