Recital 61

Online search engines*

The value of online search engines to their respective business users and end users increases as the total number of such users increases. Undertakings providing online search engines collect and store aggregated datasets containing information about what users searched for, and how they interacted with, the results with which they were provided. Undertakings providing online search engines collect these data from searches undertaken on their own online search engine and, where applicable, searches undertaken on the platforms of their downstream commercial partners. Access by gatekeepers to such ranking, query, click and view data constitutes an important barrier to entry and expansion, which undermines the contestability of online search engines. Gatekeepers should therefore be required to provide access, on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms, to those ranking, query, click and view data in relation to free and paid search generated by consumers on online search engines to other undertakings providing such services, so that those third-party undertakings can optimise their services and contest the relevant core platform services. Such access should also be given to third parties contracted by a provider of an online search engine, who are acting as processors of this data for that online search engine. When providing access to its search data, a gatekeeper should ensure the protection of the personal data of end users, including against possible re-identification risks, by appropriate means, such as anonymisation of such personal data, without substantially degrading the quality or usefulness of the data. The relevant data is anonymised if personal data is irreversibly altered in such a way that information does not relate to an identified or identifiable natural person or where personal data is rendered anonymous in such a manner that the data subject is not or is no longer identifiable.

* This title is an unofficial description.