Italian regulators have expanded their investigation of Google News to include the company's search engine in that country, according to reports.
IDG News Service reported on Friday that Italy's Antitrust Authority wants to take a closer look at Google's overall operation, a week after it followed up on complaints from news publishers that Google was excluding them from search results unless they agreed to be in Google News. Google denies the charges.
Google's 90 per cent search share of the Italian market is apparently causing regulators to wonder whether Google is having a disproportionate effect on online advertising in Italy.
Google has faced increasing competition-related scrutiny in its home country, but so far that has mainly concerned areas other than search, such as Google Books and chief executive Eric Schmidt's former role as a member of Apple's board of directors.
Some observers, such as Search Engine Land's Danny Sullivan, think Italian regulators are either confused or looking for a fight, given the clear instructions Google has provided on how to opt out of search or news separately.
The case was transferred to the US offices of Google, rather than Google Italy, since Google US runs Google News, not the subsidiaries in a particular country.
"This is a technical change because Google Italy doesn't provide Google News. We pointed this out to the authority when they visited us last week so we're not surprised by this decision," Google said in a statement.
