Google says it is being investigated by FTC

Google’s business practices are the subject of investigations by regulators in Argentina and Korea, according to a regulatory filing.

Argentina’s main antitrust agency and the Fair Trade Commission in Korea have opened an investigation into “certain business practices,” Google said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission last week.

“The Argentina’s Competition Commission notified us that they are conducting a preliminary inquiry into our search and search advertising services, and we are of course happy to answer their questions,” Google said in an e-mailed statement.

The probe in Korea, Google said, “is an ongoing inquiry that started last year and we continue to cooperate with regulators.”

A spokesman at the Fair Trade Commission declined to comment on the investigation or to be identified, citing internal policy prohibiting officials from discussing on-going probes on the record.

Google’s Seoul office was raided by Korea’s antitrust regulator as part of a probe into whether the owner of the world’s largest search engine unfairly blocked competitors in the mobile-search market.

Bloomberg