Google appeals EU DMA AI and Search orders

Google has taken the European Commission to court over two Digital Markets Act orders that would force it to open Android more deeply to rival AI assistants and to share search data with competing search engines and AI chatbots. Reuters reported on September 29 that Alphabet's Google filed the challenges at the EU General Court in Luxembourg on Monday, arguing the measures threaten user privacy and Android security.

What Brussels ordered in July

The appeals target two binding specification decisions the Commission issued in July under the Digital Markets Act, the EU rulebook for designated "gatekeepers." They are not new fines. They spell out, in detail, how Google must meet DMA obligations it already carries for Search, Android, and related services.

On Android, the order is about AI assistants. Coverage of the July decisions says rival assistants must get the same access Google's Gemini model has to a set of phone features — commonly reported as 11 capabilities — including waking by voice and performing actions inside other apps. Deadlines reported across Reuters-linked coverage and secondary reports land in mid-2027 (July in several outlets; August in others). The point of the rule is choice: European users could pick a preferred assistant and use it the way Gemini is wired into Android today.

On Search, Google must share data about what people search for and click on with competing search engines, including AI chatbots, starting in January 2027. The Commission says the data must be anonymised and shared on fair terms. Google may refuse a recipient that poses a serious cybersecurity or data-protection risk — a carve-out the company still calls insufficient.

Google's case: privacy and Android security

Oliver Bethell, Google's senior director of competition, said in a statement quoted by Reuters: "We're appealing decisions that will force us to share people's private search history without sufficient anonymisation and weaken vital security protections on Android." He added: "People use Search for their most personal questions — from medical worries to close relationships — and mandating we share these personal queries without adequate safeguards would cause irreversible harm to user privacy."

That line matches the argument Google published when the July decisions landed. Kent Walker, Google's president of global affairs, wrote on July 16 that the rulings risked exposing Europeans' private searches to unfamiliar companies "without adequate anonymisation of the data and without user knowledge or consent," and that the Android measures would grant external apps sensitive device permissions without the phone-maker vetting Google says already keeps deeply integrated AI safe.

In an August 5 Android Security & Privacy post, Google engineers Dave Kleidermacher and Eugene Liderman went further on the technical case. They said Android already hosts third-party assistants such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity inside app sandboxes, while deeper system access today runs through device-maker partnerships. The Commission, they argued, is mandating deep access — including to ambient signals such as microphone, camera, and on-screen content for some features — in ways that conflict with security-by-design rules elsewhere in EU law. Independent security experts co-signed that post's call for stronger safeguards during implementation.

What the Commission and DuckDuckGo say

A European Commission spokesperson told Reuters the Commission had taken note of the challenge and would defend its decisions in court. "More generally, it should be stressed that the Commission's two specification decisions carefully consider the integrity and security with respect to the features involved, as well as ensuring the protection of the personal data of end users," the spokesperson said.

DuckDuckGo, whose search product does not track users' search history, sided with the regulator. "The anonymization framework is robust and no amount of manufactured doubt changes that. The only thing an appeal buys Google is time," a DuckDuckGo spokesperson told Reuters.

Under EU law, filing an appeal does not by itself suspend a Commission decision. The 2027 compliance clocks keep running unless Google wins a separate suspension from the court. Several reports say Google is weighing whether to ask for that stay.

Why this fight matters beyond one lawsuit

Android is the operating system on a majority of phones in the EU. If the Android order stands, rival assistants — including products from OpenAI and other AI labs already present on the Play Store — could wake by voice and act inside apps on terms closer to Gemini's. If Google wins, its own assistant keeps the deepest platform hooks on the phones most Europeans carry.

The Search order is equally strategic. Query, click, and ranking signals are the training and relevance fuel that made Google Search hard to challenge. Sharing anonymised versions of that data is meant to help alternative engines and AI chatbots compete. Google frames the same transfer as a privacy and security risk. Privacy-focused rivals like DuckDuckGo say the anonymisation design already accounts for that objection.

The appeals also land inside a wider DMA clash. In July the Commission fined Google €890 million — €460 million for favouring its own services in Search and €430 million for restricting how developers steered users away from Google Play — and Alphabet remains a designated DMA gatekeeper. Gatekeepers can face fines of up to 10% of global annual revenue, rising to 20% for repeat offenders. Court cases over specification decisions are how those rules get stress-tested in practice.

What happens next

The General Court in Luxembourg will hear Google's challenges. That process is measured in years, not weeks. Unless a suspension is granted, Google still has to prepare for a January 2027 Search data-sharing start and a mid-2027 Android AI access deadline while the litigation runs.

For users, nothing changes on the phone tomorrow. For AI assistant makers, search rivals, and Android OEMs, the case decides how open Europe's largest mobile platform has to be — and how much of Google's Search graph must be shared — when the DMA's AI-era rules stop being theory and start shipping in software.