The day before President Donald Trump could issue another round of sweeping tariffs — and following the administration's warning to leave American tech firms alone — the E.U. on Thursday imposed a massive billion-dollar fine on Google.
You have to marvel at the timing. But that billion-dollar penalty is actually the least of it.
Last week, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told Axios that the administration is "not going to let Europe control the global regulation of our [tech] companies... because they're just gone wild with enforcement, well beyond what they need to do."
Greer wasn't talking about the two fines imposed today, "for breaching rules designed to promote competition in digital services," as CNN put it, explaining that "the fines highlight Europe’s resolve to rein in the power of Big Tech, despite US President Donald Trump threatening to respond with 'substantial additional tariffs' on European goods.
No, the worst of it came last week with a set of sweeping regulations that could effectively cripple Android — the most popular operating system in the world — in the European Union.
Don't worry, I won't drag you through the weeds on how Android works, but I'll give you a few basics, along with some easy-to-understand analysis courtesy of tech guy John Gruber, who I'll get to in a sec.
The magic of Gemini, Google's AI assistant, is how deeply woven it is into the Android operating system.
Imagine — and I don't have to imagine very hard on this one — that there's a messy pile of receipts, school fliers, and random mail on the kitchen counter. Seriously, I just walked past one. Maybe two. So you whip out your Android-powered Samsung phone and snap a quick photo of the mess.
Drop the photo into the built-in Gemini app, tap the microphone button, and say, "Sort this. Put the receipts into a spreadsheet. Flag anything over $50. Add the school events to our family calendar. Anything that looks like a bill, draft a reminder email to me three days before it’s due."
Then Gemini actually does all that stuff, nearly instantaneously, because it's a trusted Google app working with other trusted Google apps and services on your trusty phone.
But last week, the E.U. issued two decrees against Google, the first meant "to ensure that competitors’ Artificial Intelligence (AI) services can compete with Google’s own AI services, such as Gemini, by having equal access to features on Google’s Android devices."
Again, without getting too deep into the weeds, the E.U. demands that Google open up the very core of Android to Gemini's competitors. Gruber called the demands "breathtaking in scope."
"Basically," Gruber concluded, "the EC is demanding that third-party AI assistants be enabled to become part of the system software, not just apps." Not only does Brussels think it can redesign Android against Google's wishes, it wants to open up everything on users' devices to any bad actor with an AI app.
Gruber also warned that if Brussels gets what it wants, Android users could "see significant battery life drain as third-party assistants run without limits in the background and run expensive inference locally to save on their own server costs."
According to Gruber, Google has three options. Four, really, but I'm not sure one of them counts.
Google can acquiesce to the E.U.'s demands, but nobody — including Meta and Open AI, two companies with questionable reputations — takes advantage. Alternately, Google acquiesces and suddenly every E.U. Facebook and Instagram user gives up the entire contents of their phones to Mark Zuckerberg and/or Sam Altman. Or, Google could shut down Gemini integration in Europe.
Apple took one look at similar requirements and apparently decided it was simply better for the company — and likely safer for European iPhone users — not to include the same embedded AI functionality that users on every other continent enjoy. Or will, once Siri AI launches later this year.
The fourth option is that Google acquiesces, but nobody — not even Facebook — steals user data or drains their batteries. That option doesn't strain credulity so much as it feeds it feet-first into a wood-chipper.
If I were Google, I'd tell Brussels to pound sand and follow Apple's route to passive non-compliance.
And if I were a European user of Android or Apple, I might be be screwed no matter what.
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