Google CEO Sundar Pichai used a keynote speech in Paris to announce two major new media programmes, just hours before the French government announced it will seek €1.6 billion (£1.3bn) in back tax payments from the search giant.
In his keynote at Sciences Po university in Paris, Pichai said Google will finally rollout its fast-loading 'Accelerated Mobile Pages', or AMP project, and give preference to those stories at the top of search results.
First announced last fall, AMP will offer "a search carousel surfacing more news content, that loads four times faster and uses 10 times less data", Pichai announced in his first European keynote, where he received a rockstar reception. "The same code works across multiple platforms and devices, different formats and sites using paywalls," Pichai explained. "It will help publishers crack the best content and cultivate modern readers," he added on the feature, widely seen as a competitor to Facebook's own Instant Articles, and Apple's iOS app Apple News.
Content by launch partners BBC, The Guardian, La Stampa, El Mundo, France24, Radio France Internationale and more will feature during the initial AMP rollout.
In an attempt to "provide a more sustainable news ecosystem," the Google’s CEO also announced a wider rollout for Project Shield, a cyber attack protection technology operated by Jigsaw which will now be made accessible to all news organisations for free.
"There are times when news content is impossible to get to -- not because the page loads slowly but because you’re under attack," Pichai said. "Project Shield uses reverse proxy technology, which lets Google intercept bad traffic before it reaches your server, providing you a shield." Media organisations of all sizes, which are not government sponsored, will be offered shield protection as part of Google’s wish to insure that "even the smallest news organisations will be able to report a news without the fear of being taken down by digital attacks".
Pichai also said that Google’s Digital News Initiative (DNI) would invest €27 million into news organisations in 23 European countries, ranging "from automated content journalism, robot journalism, hoax-busting ads to real-time reporting". The company has already received "a huge number of applications" to these grants, Pichai said, adding that the next round would open before the summer 2016.
France was the second most represented country at this year’s CES, and Google says it wants to help entrepreneurs there gather momentum; it plans to train 200,000 French people from the technology sector, "from students to professionals", Pichai said.
Asked about his position on Apple’s recent encryption battle with the FBI, Pichai reiterated his arguably guarded support for Apple CEO Tim Cook, which he first expressed on Twitter last week. "We have to saveguard our userdata and design systems which protect privacy," he said. "Whenever you create back doors, it leads to very bad consequences that are harming users. We want to take a strong stand against any form of back door whatsoever."
Pichai’s keynote in Paris was the first talk in his European tour, which will also includes a meeting with European Union's competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager in Brussels to discuss Google’s possible violation of EU’s antitrust rules. Asked about the EU meeting, Pichai said he was looking forward to meeting Margrethe Vestager. "It’s an important dialog and it’s Google’s duty to work with governments and institutions as well as protecting our users," he said.
A question from the audience on Google’s tax avoidance received loud applause. In the UK Google has already been forced to pay £130m in back taxes, with similar efforts underway in other places. Asked when Alphabet would start paying taxes in the countries it operates, Pichai replied: "Today, as a company, we are paying taxes in the US, where our engineering and R&D happens. We are advocating for a simpler global tax system."
After his talk, Google’s CEO was heading to a meeting with at the French Ministry of Economy and Finance, that begged to disagree with his hopeful words. It was probably an interesting meeting; minutes after Pichai’s conclusion speech at Sciences Po, the French tax authority announced that it is asking Google for €1.6bn in what it claims are unpaid taxes -- on the same day that MPs in Westminster reported that the similar UK deal was too small.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
