The Turkish Competition Authority (RK) said Monday it has launched an antitrust investigation into tech giant Google over its AI-powered search features, AI Overviews and AI Mode.
The RK is examining whether Google's AI-generated search summaries negatively impact the traffic, visibility and revenues of news publishers and content creators.
The regulator, in a statement on its website, said the probe was launched under Article 41 of the Law on the Protection of Competition (Law No. 4054) to determine whether the company violated Article 6 of the same law with the features "AI Overviews" and "AI Mode" offered within the Google Search service.
It also said the authority imposed an interim injunction against Google to protect the rights of news publishers while the investigation is underway.
The Turkish probe comes amid rising concerns over the impact of Google's AI Overviews on newsrooms across the globe, with many organizations reporting a decrease in traffic on their websites.
AI Overviews is a generative artificial intelligence feature integrated into Google Search that displays AI-generated responses at the top of search results. AI Mode, on the other hand, is a conversational feature, resembling leading AI chatbots and providing users with responses to their queries.
As part of the preliminary investigation initiated with the RK decision dated Aug. 27, 2026, the following issues were examined:
- How AI Overviews and AI Mode transformed users' access to information behavior and whether this adversely impacted traffic directed to news publishers and other content producers;
- Whether the conditions in the agreements signed between Google and news publishers regarding the use of content are of an unfair contract nature;
- Whether AI Overviews and AI Mode have an exclusionary effect on news publishers, other content producers, and AI chat assistants;
- Whether different practices occur regarding the selection of news publishers' content as a source in AI Overviews and AI Mode or regarding the licensing of content.
"In addition to launching an investigation, due to the strong suspicion of discriminatory and exploitative behaviors concerning news publishers, the RK decided in its meeting on Oct. 8, 2026, to apply interim measures," it said.
These measures aim to prevent discrimination against news publishers and ensure that the terms reflect the economic value of content usage, it added.
They also aim to allow publishers to make their choices regarding content usage in these services independently of their visibility and indexing in other Google services.
