James Kanter

When it comes to Europe’s lengthy investigations into Google, Margrethe Vestager, the region’s competition chief, is hoping that the third time’s a charm. Vestager announced a new round of antitrust charges against the company — the third set since early 2015 — claiming that some of the company’s advertising products had restricted consumer choice. The efforts are part of her continuing push to rein in Google’s activities in the European Union, where the Silicon Valley company has captured roughly 90 percent of the region’s online search market.

“Google’s conduct, based on our evidence, is harmful to consumers,” she said. “Google’s magnificent innovations don’t give it the right to deny competitors the chance to innovate.” The announcement represents a setback for Google, which vigorously denied any wrongdoing in two previous European antitrust charges linked to Android, its popular mobile operating system, and some of its dominant online search services. It also comes at a difficult time for Europe’s competition authorities, which have been unable to land a knockout punch against Google’s perceived abusive activities in the region, despite investigations that date back to 2010. The stakes are high. Google could face fines of up to 10 percent, or about $7 billion, of its global annual revenue if it is found to have broken Europe’s tough competition rules.

Joaquín Almunia, the European Union’s antitrust chief, said that he might yet take a tougher stance toward Google in a long-running case that he and the company have been in talks to settle for more than a year.

The announcement is a potential blow for Google, which reached a tentative deal with Almunia in February by agreeing to display rivals’ links more prominently in its search results.

Google has been trying to resolve the three-year case and avoid a potential fine of up to $5 billion. But whether the announcement was an indication of a new hard line by Almunia or a diplomatic nod to the company’s many critics in Europe was not clear. And any action would still be months away.

The top data protection official for the European Union called for member governments to restore public trust in the Internet by pressing ahead with an overhaul of the bloc’s electronic privacy laws by the end of 2014.

The official, Peter Hustinx, the European data protection supervisor, also called on President Barack Obama to stick to his pledge to review American privacy rules in the wake of disclosures that have exposed the vast reach of government surveillance that has shaken trans-Atlantic relations. Another bill, aimed at providing more equitable access for companies and consumers to the Internet -- “network neutrality” -- and making mobile phone roaming less costly to consumers is now before the European Parliament, which is scheduled to vote on that legislation.

Hustinx stressed the urgency of keeping the privacy legislation moving through the Council of the European Union in Brussels, the body in which national governments meet to adopt laws and coordinate policies. Hustinx called on the bloc’s 28 member states to reach a deal with one another and with the Parliament by the end of 2014, because “the 21st century requires stronger rights, stronger responsibilities, more consistency across Europe.” Hustinx also challenged the United States government to do more in updating its own rules.

“There are some interesting movements in Washington, but we’d like to see much more,” he said. “If trust should be rebuilt, then it certainly takes a number of actions at the other side as well.” Hustinx suggested that European governments could be given added reassurance they would be in sync with the American approach to data privacy, if a group led by John Podesta, a special adviser to President Obama, issues its report on data privacy this spring as expected.