Getty Images Inc., the world's largest photo agency, complained
earlier this year to European antitrust officials that Google Inc.
unfairly favors its image-search service over rivals, potentially
adding another sector to the continent's antitrust investigation of
the Internet-search giant.
In early June, the European Commission told Getty that its
concerns were relevant and added Getty as an "interested third
person" in its search-manipulation case against Google, according
to a document reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. That allows the
firm to participate in hearings and submit evidence to the European
Commission, according to antitrust experts.
The commission in April charged Google with favoring its own
shopping service over rivals in search results. The regulator wants
Google to change how it ranks shopping services and warned of large
fines if Google doesn't comply.
Beyond shopping, the commission also said it was actively
investigating Google's alleged favorable treatment of specialized
search services in areas such as local search, travel and maps.
Getty's complaint could ultimately add image search to that
list.
"It's entirely possible for [the commission] to expand the scope
of the investigation" based on additional information from
companies in related businesses, said Alan Riley, a competition-law
expert at the law school of City University London.
The European Commission declined to comment.
A Google spokesman declined to comment. Google has denied
breaking EU antitrust rules. U.S. regulators closed their own
investigation into Google's search practices two years ago after
the company agreed to voluntary changes.
Getty Images, majority owned by private-equity firm Carlyle
Group and part-owned by members of the Getty oil family, has a
digital trove of more than 100 million images, which it licenses
and sells to publishers, advertisers and websites. More recently,
it has been building a consumer business to distribute its images
more widely, putting it in closer competition with Google.
Getty told European regulators that its efforts to drive traffic
to its websites, including gettyimages.com, have been stymied by
Google's prominent display of its own image search service in
general Google search results.
In one example Getty cited, a search for "stock photos of coffee
shop" on Google.com showed a page with ads and results from Google
Images above a link to coffee shop photos on gettyimages.com.
This positioning drives more traffic to Google Images, even when
it's not the best offering for consumers, Getty argued. That's
because Google Images includes photos from other websites and
publishers, rather than original, licensed content, the firm
said.
The lack of traffic to Getty Images' websites also makes it
harder for the company to collect data on visitors and their
searches, information that can help improve its image-search
service, it told European regulators.
Google has "created a captive environment that ensures that
traffic on Google almost never diverts to the source sites of the
images," a Getty Images spokesman said in a statement.
Getty Images' revenue growth has slowed because fewer people are
coming to its websites from Google search pages, which means less
of its content is being licensed and purchased, according to a
person familiar with the situation.
Getty Images also complained to the European Commission that
when Google shows large, high-quality Getty-owned photos and puts
them on its own Image Search service this encourages people to copy
the images for their own use, potentially infringing photographers'
copyright.
Getty Images sued Microsoft Corp. in 2014 alleging a Bing image
search service infringed copyright. Getty dropped the suit this
year. The two then signed a partnership deal in which Getty
provides licensed content and related data about the images and
Bing shows official versions of its photos in search results. Getty
told European regulators that Google has refused to pay or partner
like this.
This touches on another part of Europe's broader investigation
of Google. The regulator is looking into complaints that Google
copies rivals' Web content for use on its own sites, a practice
known as scraping.
Tom Fairless contributed to this article.
Corrections & Amplifications
Getty Images is majority owned by private-equity firm Carlyle
Group. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said Getty
Images was majority owned by Hellman & Friedman LLC.
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