Newspapers in Italy claim AI Overviews threaten their survival.
The Italian federation of newspaper publishers (FIEG) has filed a formal complaint with Italy’s communications watchdog AGCOM against “traffic killer” Google AI Overviews.
Google is driving users away from clicking on news sites due to its immediate AI responses, FIEG accuses, in a move that risks “serious consequences for the economic sustainability and diversity of the media”.
Launched in Italy in March, AI Overview is a Google feature that uses generative AI to provide a summary of information at the top of search results, designed to quickly answer questions by drawing from multiple sources.
FIEG states that Google is prioritising its AI-generated responses, which are placed directly in the results list, above the original sources – newspaper websites – in user searches.
Publishers allege that with AI Overview, along with the AI Mode feature introduced in recent weeks, Google is violating key provisions set out in the EU Digital Services Act (DSA).
Similar complaints are being filed in other EU countries, coordinated by the European Newspaper Publishers’ Association (ENPA), with the aim of pushing the European Commission into investigating Google under the DSA.
“We’re talking about a product that not only directly competes with content produced by publishing companies but also reduces their visibility and discoverability, and therefore their advertising revenue, threatening their refinancing”, FIEG said in a statement.
In addition to the economic threat to newspapers and reduced diversity for the reader, FIEG claims the move risks leading to “a lack of transparency and the proliferation of disinformation in democratic debate.”
Last month Italy became the first EU country to regulate artificial intelligence, approving sweeping new laws that require human oversight and traceability of AI decisions.
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