EU targets Google’s Android AI and search data in new Digital Markets Act proceedings

BRUSSELS — European Union regulators have launched two formal proceedings that could force Google to open key artificial intelligence features on Android phones to rivals and share more of its valuable search data with competing services, escalating the bloc’s enforcement of its landmark Digital Markets Act (DMA).

On Jan. 27, the European Commission said it had opened “specification proceedings” under the DMA to spell out how Alphabet Inc.’s Google must comply with two obligations covering interoperability for AI services on Android and access to online search data.

The actions do not amount to a finding that Google has broken EU law. Instead, they are a newer enforcement tool that allows the Commission to define in detail what a designated “gatekeeper” platform must do to meet rules set out in the DMA. The proceedings are based in Brussels and led jointly by the Commission’s competition and digital-affairs departments.

The Commission said it aims to conclude both cases within six months. Within three months, it plans to send Google preliminary findings and draft measures and publish nonconfidential summaries to solicit feedback from competitors, publishers, consumer groups and other interested parties. If, after those steps, regulators ultimately decide Google is not complying, they can adopt separate noncompliance decisions and impose fines of up to 10% of the company’s global annual turnover, rising to 20% for repeat offenses.

Two fronts: Android AI and search data

The first proceeding focuses on Article 6(7) of the DMA, which requires gatekeepers to let other service and hardware providers tap into the same operating system and virtual-assistant features that the gatekeeper’s own services use, free of charge. The Commission said it will examine “hardware and software features controlled by Android” that are used by Google’s own AI services, including its Gemini assistant.

Officials did not list specific Android “entry points” in their decision. But the provision is widely understood to cover system-level features such as the default voice-assistant slot, the way an assistant can be launched from the home screen or via the power button, and access to certain on-device processing and contextual APIs.

Henna Virkkunen, the Commission’s executive vice president in charge of tech sovereignty, security and democracy, said the goal is to ensure rival services can compete on equal terms with Google’s own tools as AI becomes embedded in smartphones.

“We want to keep AI markets open and contestable,” she said in a statement. “Third-party search and AI providers should have the same ability as Google’s own services to access Android capabilities and search data, so that innovation and competition can benefit consumers and businesses in Europe.”

The second proceeding addresses Article 6(11) of the DMA, which obliges gatekeepers that run online search engines to give third-party search services access, on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms, to anonymized data generated by users’ queries. That includes ranking, query, click and view data from both free and paid searches.

The Commission said it will clarify four main points: how extensive and granular the data shared by Google must be; what anonymization techniques are compatible with both the DMA and EU privacy rules; what conditions and pricing qualify as “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory”; and whether AI chatbots and generative AI services that provide searchlike functionality count as “online search engines” entitled to receive that data.

Privacy, AI and the scope of “search”

The search-data provision sits at the intersection of the DMA and the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Guidance issued by EU data protection authorities says only the personal data of the user who performs the search must be anonymized before sharing, but notes that information about third parties mentioned in queries can still be personal data and must be handled under GDPR rules.

Regulators say anonymization has to be assessed realistically — in light of what a data recipient or another party could reasonably do to reidentify users — and must be supported by both technical safeguards and contractual limits on how the data may be used.

For Google’s rivals, access to such data is vital. Search logs containing what people click on, skip and refine after an initial query are used to train and evaluate ranking algorithms and conversational AI models. Smaller competitors argue they cannot build services that match Google’s performance without some access to similar behavioral data.

One unresolved question in the new proceedings is whether AI chatbots that answer user questions in a conversational format, sometimes drawing on web content, will be recognized as “online search engines” under EU law. If they are, large language model providers operating in Europe could gain a new source of high-quality training and evaluation data.

Google pushes back on privacy and security grounds

Google said it is already making changes to comply with the DMA and questioned the need for additional binding measures.

“Android is open by design, and we already offer users and developers a wide range of choices,” Clare Kelly, Google’s senior competition counsel, said in a statement. She said the company is “already licensing search data to competitors under the DMA” and warned that further rules, which she characterized as “largely driven by complaints from rivals rather than clear consumer demand,” risk undermining user interests.

“Additional obligations could compromise user privacy and security and slow down innovation in AI services that people value,” Kelly said.

EU officials argue that the DMA allows only restrictions that are strictly necessary and proportionate to protect the integrity and security of an operating system. They maintain that properly anonymized data sharing, combined with GDPR enforcement, can preserve privacy while reducing the ability of a few large platforms to accumulate and exploit vast exclusive data sets.

Teresa Ribera, the Commission’s executive vice president for a clean, just and competitive transition, said AI tools are rapidly changing how people access information and services.

“We want to maximize the benefits of this technological shift,” she said. “That requires making sure the playing field is not tilted in favor of a handful of the largest players.”

From retroactive fines to prescriptive rules

The new proceedings mark a shift from the EU’s earlier approach to Google, which relied on traditional antitrust investigations that can take years and focus on past conduct.

In 2018 the Commission fined Google €4.34 billion for using its Android mobile operating system to strengthen the dominance of Google Search, including by tying the licensing of its app store to preinstallation of Google apps. The EU’s General Court largely upheld that decision in 2022, trimming the fine to €4.125 billion. Earlier cases covered Google Shopping and online advertising, resulting in fines of €2.42 billion and €1.49 billion respectively.

Those decisions helped pave the way for the DMA, a regulation adopted in 2022 that sets upfront rules for “gatekeeper” platforms, including Google Search, Android, Chrome, Google Play and YouTube. Alphabet was formally designated a gatekeeper in September 2023 and has been required to comply fully with the DMA since March 7, 2024.

Since then, the Commission has opened several DMA cases targeting Google’s conduct, including preliminary findings in March 2025 that the company continued to favor its own services in search results and restricted app developers’ ability to steer users to alternative payment options outside Google Play. In November 2025, regulators also began examining whether Google’s policy of demoting sites with certain types of partner content unfairly harms news publishers.

The specification tool now being applied to Android and search data was first used last year against Apple, when the Commission moved to define how Apple must provide interoperability for certain iOS connectivity features. That case resulted in a detailed list of functionalities Apple has to open and rules for handling interoperability requests from third parties.

High stakes for AI rivals and European industry

If the Commission ultimately adopts binding specification decisions against Google, the outcome could reshape how AI and search services compete on Android phones in Europe.

Open access to the same system hooks that power Gemini could allow rival assistants — including European AI applications — to be set as defaults and launched with the same ease as Google’s own tool. That would chip away at the advantage that comes from being the preinstalled or deeply integrated option.

At the same time, clearer rules forcing Google to share anonymized search, click and ranking data on fair terms could lower barriers for competing search engines and AI services that lack their own large reservoirs of user behavior data. European policymakers have presented the DMA as part of a broader “tech sovereignty” strategy aimed at reducing dependence on a few non-European digital giants.

For publishers and small businesses, the changes are more complex. News outlets and other content providers are already grappling with forecasts that a larger share of user attention will flow through AI assistants and chatbots rather than traditional search results pages. If more services gain access to Google-grade data, their content could be surfaced in a wider array of tools, diversifying traffic but also fragmenting audiences and advertising revenue streams.

Small and medium-sized businesses may find themselves needing to optimize for a greater number of search and AI platforms, potentially reducing their reliance on Google alone but increasing the complexity of digital marketing.

The proceedings against Google will also unfold as the EU’s separate AI Act moves toward full enforcement, with the Commission seeking to align rules on competition, data protection and AI safety. Taken together, those regimes will help define how far Europe can go in requiring dominant tech firms to open up their software and data without discouraging investment in new technologies.

The Commission’s decisions in the Google cases, expected by late July, are likely to serve as reference points not only for other gatekeepers such as Apple, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft and ByteDance, but also for regulators in other jurisdictions weighing how to regulate the power of AI-era platforms.