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  3. On Wednesday, the European Union brought down an antitrust fine of 4.34 billion euros — or about $5.06 billion — against Google,

On Wednesday, the European Union brought down an antitrust fine of 4.34 billion euros — or about $5.06 billion — against Google,

admin2019-05-04  93
问题    On Wednesday, the European Union brought down an antitrust fine of 4.34 billion euros — or about $5.06 billion — against Google, for anticompetitive practices related to Android, the company’s mobile operating system. It’s the European Commission’s largest antitrust fine ever, topping the previous record of 2.42 billion euros — which was also levied against Google, just last year, for abuses of its search-engine dominance.
   At issue is how Google has used the proliferation of Android, which runs on more than 80 percent of smartphones worldwide, to entrench its other services, especially Search. In exchange for receiving Android for free, Google demands that phone makers preinstall Google apps and services, such as Search and the Chrome browser. The European Commission’s regulators contend that this default stifles competing apps and services.
   Furthermore, according to the European Commission’s decision, Google has prevented phone manufacturers from installing alternate builds of Android. Android is an open-source operating system, meaning that others can make their own, customized versions of it (Fire OS, used on Amazon’s devices, is one example). If manufacturers can’t actually use different versions of Android, then the software’s open-source status doesn’t actually help it increase competition and consumer choice.
   "It’s a very serious illegal behavior," Margrethe Vestager, the European commissioner for competition, said in a press conference announcing the decision. But a big question remains: What does the decision mean for Google and other big tech companies? This might be the tip of the iceberg for global technology regulation, for which Europe has been doing the work the United States can’t, or won’t, pursue.
   Still, the amount is a drop in the bucket when compared to Alphabet’s overall financial picture. While the company also took a $9.9 billion one-time charge related to changes in U.S. tax law, Google’s success is only growing — its net revenues climbed by 20 percent over 2016, and almost that much over the year prior. And like other big tech companies, Google is sitting on huge piles of cash: about $102 billion, of which $62.8 billion is foreign held. That makes the possible $8 billion from the two antitrust fines — Google appealed the first decision, and indicated its intention to appeal the new one, too — more of an inconvenience than an existential crisis. Alphabet’s shares traded only slightly lower following the announcement of the EU fine, suggesting that investors weren’t terribly concerned about the matter, at least for now.
According to Paragraph 3, the author believes that the practice of Google may______.
选项 A、forbid phone makers to use different versions of Amazon’s devices
B、do more harm than good for the competiveness of Android
C、help to expand the influence of Google apps and services
D、contribute to create a unique and customized version of Android
答案B
解析 题干问：根据第三段，作者认为谷歌的行为可能______。根据第三段第三句：If manufacturers can’t actually use different versions of Android，then the software’s open—source status doesn’t actually help it increase competition and consumer choice．(如果制造商不能使用不同版本的安卓，那么该软件的开放性并不能实际帮助其提高竞争性以及增加用户选择。)只有选项[B]与之对应，故为答案。
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