Google reaches $7.8M settlement with Russia in antitrust case

Google is paying a $7.8 million fine and agreeing to open up its Android mobile operating system to competitors' search engines in Russia. The settlement ends a two-year fight with Russian antitrust regulators.

The Federal Antimonopoly Service of Russia (FAS) in 2015 found Google was violating competition laws by including its own search tool on the operating system. Google would preload its own apps, including the search engine, on phones running Android. Russian users didn't have the option of changing to a different search engine on those phones. Now, under the terms of the settlement, the Android operating system will no longer exclusively have Google apps preinstalled in Russia, and users will be able to pick their default search engines, according to the FAS. The $7.8 million fine is roughly 9 percent of Google's 2014 revenue in Russia. The decision will give an opportunity for the Russian search engine Yandex NV to increase its own market share in mobile search. Yandex had originally brought the complaint against Google.