Why is google interested in acquiring doubleclick

Today, none of the top 5 market players in find a place in the top 3 in except Google. The merger also generated considerable interest from anti-trust commissions in Europe and the US at that time. But ultimately Federal Trade Commission gave its green signal. By , MSN focused heavily on building a better product, largely through better technology.

MSN was reporting losses to the tune of a few hundred million dollars. Post this acquisition, Microsoft Corp. The deal was supposed to change everything for Microsoft, creating a viable rival to Google in online advertising.

Steve Ballmer, said, the deal would have helped Microsoft become profitable in online advertising. Google has managed to retain market leadership in the advertising business and further strengthened its position by investing in the business over the years. This was largely due to the DoubleClick deal. What do you think? Is DoubleClick acquisition that has made Google an advertising giant today? But what we can say for sure Google is invincible now.

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In a settlement announced this week, the Commission failed to do so. EPIC wrote that "companies that protect user privacy are being absorbed by companies that do not protect privacy. EPIC previously told the Subcommittee on Antitrust that "the internet advertising system today is not healthy. Two companies dominate the market.

The privacy of Internet users is under assault. The revenue model that sustained journalism is broken. The current model is not sustainable. Privacy rules can help level the playing field. The FTC announced a new task force dedicated to monitoring U. FTC Chairman Joe Simons said "it makes sense for us to closely examine technology markets to ensure consumers benefit from free and fair competition.

EPIC has called on the FTC to require Google to divest Nest, after reports that the company hid listening devices in the home thermostat, and pressed the Commission to use its equitable authorities, including divestiture, to enforce consent orders. Consumer organizations in the US and the European Union recently urged antitrust authorities on both sides of the Atlantic to subject mergers to greater scrutiny. The ad platforms are manipulated by foreign adversaries.

Secrecy and complexity are increasing as accountability is diminished. It would be foolish to imagine that the current model is sustainable. EPIC testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in about the growing risks to competition and privacy of mergers in the online advertising industry.

EPIC filed an amicus with a federal appeals court urging the court to reject a proposed class action settlement in a consumer privacy case. The case involved Google tracking internet users in violation of the users' privacy settings.

EPIC said the settlement resulted in no change in business practices and wrongly awarded cy pres funds to organizations that Google would otherwise support. The settlement was also opposed by the Attorneys General of thirteen states. EPIC has proposed an objective basis for courts to make determinations in consumer privacy cases that protect the interests of class members and avoid the risk of collusion between the parties in settlement.

EPIC urged the Committee to consider the role of consumer privacy and data protection in merger reviews. EPIC warned that "monopoly platforms" are reducing competition, stifling innovation, and undermining privacy. EPIC also suggested that "algorithmic transparency" would become increasingly important for merger analysis. EPIC is a leading consumer privacy advocate and regularly submits complaints urging investigations and changes to unfair business practices. Ars Technica reported this week that Google "quietly" changed its privacy policy this summer to combine tracking data and user ID - data it had previously promised to keep separated.

The revised policy now says that "your activity on other sites and apps may be associated with your personal information" for ad delivery. EPIC has also recommended a transparent process for evaluation of substantial changes in business practices by companies subject to FTC consent orders.

EPIC, along with 26 technical experts and legal scholars, has submitted extensive comments for the FTC's review of the merger remedy process. EPIC urged the Commission to consider the privacy risks to consumers that result from the merger of big data firms.

EPIC urged the FTC to asses both competitive and privacy impacts of merger, and to enforce privacy commitments prior to granting merger approval. In a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission , Google announced plans to place targeted ads on Google-controlled appliances. Google wrote that "a few years from now, we and other companies could be serving ads and other content on refrigerators, car dashboards, thermostats, glasses, and watches, to name just a few possibilities.

WhatsApp is a messaging service that gained popularity based on its strong pro-privacy approach to user data. WhatsApp currently has million active users, many of whom have objected to the proposed acquisition.

Facebook regularly incorporates data from companies it has acquired. Google violated state consumer protection and privacy law by placing advertising tracking cookies on Safari browsers despite telling users that it would honor the default Safari privacy settings, which prevented the placement of such cookies.

Earlier EPIC had urged the Federal Trade Commission and other consumer protection agencies to support advertising models that are not linked to actual user identity. The changes will not require Google to seek the affirmative consent of users before putting their personal information to commercial use. Minors, however, will not be subject to the changes.

A Consent Order with the Federal Trade Commission prohibits Google from making misrepresentations and requires the company to obtain user consent before disclosing information to third parties. EPIC recently objected to similar practices by Facebook that would allow the company to routinely use the names, images, and content of Facebook users for commercial advertising without consent.

The documents describe the efforts of the NSA to de-anonymize Tor users by compromising their computers and Tor software with viruses. Despite their efforts, the documents reveal that the intelligence community has had limited success compromising the Tor network.

One presentation, titled "Tor Stinks," concludes that they will "never be able to de-anonymize all Tor users all the time. In , EPIC had also filed a complaint with the FTC about Doubleclick's efforts to merge users' browsing activity with personally identifying information.

For more information, see EPIC v. The Commission is investigating whether Google used its dominant position in the display advertising market, following the acquisition of Doubleclick, to harm competition.

The Federal Trade Commission announced that it had concluded its investigation into allegedly anticompetitive practices by Google.

The Commission reached a settlement with Google that would give competitors access to patents necessary to make smart phones, laptops, and other devices, and Google voluntarily agreed to stop borrowing others' content for use in its own services. On the issue of search bias, however, the Commission decided to close the investigation without taking action.

Despite finding some evidence that changes to the company's search algorithm harmed competitors, the Commission said that these changes "could be plausibly justified as innovations that improved Google's product and the experience of its users.

Recently, the Senate held a hearing on Google's use of its dominance in the search market to suppress competition, and EPIC urged the Federal Trade Commission to investigate Google's use of Youtube search rankings to give preferential treatment to its own video content over non-Google content.

Users can opt out of seeing personalized search results, but cannot opt out of having their information found through Google search. Also, Google's changes come at a time when the company is facing increased scrutiny over whether it distorts search results by giving preference to its own content.

Google has also acknowledged that the FTC is investigating whether Google uses its dominance in the search field to inhibit competition in other areas. EPIC sent a letter to the FTC urging the Trade Commission to investigate the extent to which Google has used its dominance in the search market to influence the marketplace of online video content. EPIC said that Google substituted its own subjective, "relevance" ranking in place of objective search criteria, such as "Hits" or "Rankings," to preference Google's own video material over non-Google material.

EPIC's letter includes detailed examples using the search term "privacy. Google has acknowledged that the Federal Trade Commission has opened an investigation into the search company's business practices for possible antitrust violations.

The investigation likely focuses on whether Google uses its dominance in the search field to inhibit competition in other areas. In response to the recent announcement that Google has agreed to adopt a "Comprehensive Privacy Plan," EPIC has launched "Fix Google Privacy," a campaign to encourage Internet users to offer their suggestions to improve safeguards for Google's products and services. All comments must be sent before May 2, Among other issues, the Subcommittee will focus on competition in online markets and internet search, as well as oversight of the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission.

The European Commission announced it is investigating Google for potential anti-trust violations. The Commission decided to initiate formal proceedings against Google after complaints from search-service providers "about unfavorable treatment of their services in Google's unpaid and sponsored search results coupled with an alleged preferential placement of Google's own services.

When the Agency approved the merger without any conditions, EPIC charged that the Agency had "reason to act, and authority to act, but failed to do so. A letter signed by 38 researchers and academics in the fields of computer science, information security and privacy law was sent to Google's CEO. The groups argued that the combined company will have unparalleled access to Web users' personal information.

The commission downplayed concerns brought by the two groups, saying privacy concerns are "not unique to Google and DoubleClick," and "extend to the entire online advertising marketplace. Peter Swire, a professor of antitrust and privacy law at Ohio State University's Moritz College of Law, said the FTC missed its chance to explain more clearly how privacy fits into antitrust law.

And "traditional antitrust focus is to make sure there's competition on quality. So if we have that kind of effect on quality, then antitrust enforcement should kick in. Google collects much less information about users' Web-surfing habits than DoubleClick, Swire explained. If the merger goes through, Google will be able to collect much deeper information on consumers who use its search engine. So for users who want to protect their privacy, the quality of the search product may be reduced because search previously was conducted without the combined deep and broad tracking that will be done after the merger, he said.

Today, European consumer groups warned the European Commission, which also has to approve the merger , that Google's plan to take over DoubleClick would erode consumers' privacy and would push up prices for online goods and services.

In a letter to Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes, the BEUC, the pan-European Union consumer group, and three national associations urged the commission to use its powers to block the deal in its current form.

In addition to privacy concerns, the letter argued that the combined strength of the two Internet companies would harm consumers "with respect to the price, degree of innovation, quality and selection of online products and services that would likely be available to consumers following the merger.