Mark Van Scyoc / Shutterstock.com
Yelp has sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) asserting that Google is improperly using Yelp images in local search results in violation of its 2013 antitrust settlement with the regulatory agency. Yelp also circulated the letter to several members of Congress and state attorneys general, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.
The 2013 settlement concluded nearly two years of investigations and political maneuvering. As part of the agreement, Google said it would:
Reportedly, the commitment lasts through the end of this year, though that isn’t explicitly stated in the FTC discussion of the settlement or Google’s accompanying letter to the FTC.
The “do not crawl” provision of the settlement agreement came partly in response to 2011 Yelp claims that Google was requiring that the review site allow use of its content on Google Place Pages as a condition of being included in Google’s search index.
I have been unable to independently find Yelp images being used in Google Maps. However, the WSJ article cites multiple examples:
If Google is found in violation of the 2013 settlement agreement, each instance “may result in a civil penalty of up to $16,000,” according to the FTC release. If each image is treated as a separate violation, that would hypothetically trigger penalties of more than $6 billion, which is entirely unlikely.
If the “do not crawl” provision of the agreement does in fact expire at the end of this year, it’s not clear what will happen in 2018. Google could potentially resume crawling and inclusion of third-party content over publisher objections. I suspect, however, that Google would not do so and risk a high-profile outcry from Yelp and potentially others.
Such a move wouldn’t help Google’s case in Europe, nor in the US, where an uncertain and volatile political climate could potentially create new risks for the company.
Postscript: After this story posted, Google provided the following comment:
Contributing authors are invited to create content for Search Engine Land and are chosen for their expertise and contribution to the search community. Our contributors work under the oversight of the editorial staff and contributions are checked for quality and relevance to our readers. The opinions they express are their own.
