German ruling declares Google liable for false answers in AI Overviews
the-decoder.com863 points by ahlCVA 15 hours ago
863 points by ahlCVA 15 hours ago
If I get it correctly I like the ruling.
So Google has established a product called Search. For that product rules have been established. Google has monopolized that product.
Now Google is replacing that product with a new product. But they keep calling it the same thing. Because they want to keep their monopoly.
That is what has been deemed illegal. Gemini is not illegal. Pretending the worst version of Gemini is Search is illegal, because it breaks the rules established for Search.
But IANAL.
It has nothing to do with monopolies. Google was protected from defamation law with search because the page title and snippets were direct quotes from the linked result page. Whereas with AI overviews, the copy is written by a Google-controlled LLM.
It should be noted that defamation law has a very low threshold in Germany, to the point that businesses routinely sue Google Maps users for less-than-5-stars reviews. Google had to change their display of reviews because of this.
Three stars review is taken down for "libel": https://support.google.com/maps/thread/367778263/google-maps...
HNer gets a legal threat after saying that he didn't like a doctor: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44734895
Google maps german policy: https://support.google.com/contributionpolicy/answer/1699727...
Meanwhile, service in Germany is still rather poor (especially if you have children), but at least no one can complain!
You cannot get sued for a review just because it's lower than 5 stars. But of course if you write something like "I found a dead cockroach in my pizza", or "I hard that they don't clean the dishes enough" in a review without proof, that's defamation. And it doesn't matter if you give 1 or 5 stars with the review.
There are agencies in Germany where you can buy review removals in a web shop for like 50 euros per review.
You just have to link the review and they will send Google a legal document to delete it.
That sounds like a great incentive for such an agency to create the reviews in the first place...
For any given system, you’ll have those that try to play it straight - and those that will only ever try to play it crooked.
Make one big enough, and you’ll even have people trying to play it crooked by pretending to play it straight.
So you can take down any especially glowing reviews of your competitors for only 50€ a shot? Nice!
Multiple people report that comments such as "Service was slow", or three star rating without comment were removed.
If Google started to show how many reviews were removed, it was because the lawfare started to seriously affect the ratings.
Yes, Google just removes them as a first step because this is the least amount of work for them. Theoretically there is an Google appeals process. After that it needs to go to court.
My guess is that often reviews are generalizing (easy mistake to make). E.g. they say "service is slow", when they should say: "When I was there on Thursday at noon service was slow for my table".
When reading a review, it should always be assumed that it is based off of one "visit". A negative review will probably never have more than a few visits and if they do they'd normally say "I used to come here a lot but after new ownership service sucks!"
"Lawfare" is a propogandistic term coined and used hypocritically by people who get away with doing illegal things themselves, and have a long track record of getting revenge for being legally indicted and prosecuted, by gleefully going after innocent people on their enemies list with the very legal system they control themselves. And you know exactly who I mean, who uses that term all the time.
The term is older than Trump. Suing everyone who criticizes you is a classic example of lawfare. The goal is not justice but the chilling effect created by your legal actions.
Anecdotal
Of course, Google spends engineering/legal hours to make country-specific changes relative to problems that do not exist.
Save your breath. CarlitosHighway's posts on this thread shows he's just blindly running defense for Germany's status quo on defamation laws low threshold for abuse on every argument someone brings, not being open to arguing in good faith, weightings in on the pros and cons of this, so it doesn't matter what counterexamples you keep bringing to him, it won't change his mind, his replies will be more "anecdotal" snarks.
When you see the pattern, best to stopped arguing with such users as their goal is not an honest debate, their goal is just to 'DDoS' you with their opinion.