[단독] The Fair Trade Commission plans to impose a penalty of 50 billion won on Google for allegations of’game company’

Input 2021.01.25 14:06

Suspicion that “Google forced the app market to prevent competition”
FTC judges “providing preferential treatment and abuse of control”
Two years and nine months after the investigation began in April 2018
50 billion won in fine, no prosecution charges
The final conclusion through the plenary meeting after hearing the Google call

It was confirmed that the Fair Trade Commission sent Google a review report stating that it should impose a fine of 50 billion won in connection with the alleged abuse of Google’s game platform market power. It has been 2 years and 9 months since the start of a formal investigation. It is reported that the examination report did not include prosecution charges related to violations of the Fair Trade Act.

According to the IT industry on the 25th, the FTC recently completed an investigation into Google’s domestic mobile game development and distribution-related suspicions and sent out a review report. The FTC usually determines the final violation and the level of sanctions at a plenary meeting after sending the audit report and listening to the opinions of the parties (Google).

As a result of the survey, the FTC determined that Google provided some benefits to game companies that used its application (app) market (market)’Google Play Store’, resulting in the effect of excluding other competing platforms. The review report is reported to contain a content that a fine of 50 billion won will be imposed on charges of abuse of market power. However, it was decided not to file a prosecution complaint to criminally punish the person in charge.

In this regard, an official from the FTC said, “It is difficult to confirm because it is an issue under investigation.” Google Korea also responded that it was “hard to confirm” as to whether it received the review report.

Google was suspicious of “cheating”, such as asking domestic game companies not to register in “One Store”, another app market, or giving profits or disadvantages as a condition when domestic game companies release mobile games on the “Google Play Store”. At the time in 2018, NCsoft’s’Lineage M’and Netmarble’s’Lineage 2 Revolution’ were released only in Google and Apple App Stores and did not appear on the One Store, so they were suspicious of unfair behavior.

Google’s share in the domestic app market is 60%, which is an absolute share. In order to acquire a large number of users while launching a mobile game, it must be released on the Google Play Store. On the other hand, One Store is a platform created by Naver, three telecom companies such as SK Telecom, KT, and LG Uplus, and has a 10% market share in the app market.

The FTC began investigating domestic game companies in April 2018 to see if there was any unfair behavior by Google. In August of the same year, a field survey was also conducted on the Google Korea office in Yeoksam-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.

At the time, Google said, “It does not provide any benefits to developers who release apps on the Google Play Store. Likewise, all apps on Google Play are presented with an opportunity to be seen and recommended to users regardless of whether third-party app markets are released.” . It is said that it has never committed unfair acts such as discrimination against domestic game companies by releasing a game on the One Store. Google explained that it is up to each developer to decide which app market to put the game on, and there is no disadvantage as long as it adheres to the contract and program policy with Google Play.

As the FTC concluded the first decision on the suspicion of a game company, attention is also being focused on judging the case related to Google’s own payment system,’in-app payment’.

From October this year, Google plans to expand the in-app payment, which was obligated only for existing games, to all digital contents such as music, webtoons, and videos. If you use in-app payment, you have to pay a fee to Google for 30% of the payment, so domestic content companies are fiercely protesting that it is “the tyranny of the platform.” On the other hand, Google said, “It is inevitable to apply in-app payment due to the cost and security issues involved in operating the platform.” The Fair Trade Commission is reviewing whether Google’s in-app payment enforcement violates the Fair Trade Act.