Google has created separate search spam rules for websites in the European Economic Area, allowing sites that might otherwise face manual actions under its site reputation abuse policy to retain independent rankings. The change, dated Aug. 28, 2026, formalized proposals Google made in May to address European Commission concerns about news search and ranking. Existing guidance says manual demotions would not apply to users in the 27 European Union countries, Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein from Aug. 30, while the policy remains unchanged elsewhere. The European Commission opened a formal investigation on Nov. 13, 2025, into whether enforcement unfairly disadvantaged news publishers and other websites hosting third-party commercial content. On July 23, 2026, the Commission fined Google €890 million, its first penalty against the company under the Digital Markets Act, over alleged self-preferencing. The DMA designates Google as a gatekeeper and allows fines of up to 10% of global annual turnover, along with daily penalties for continuing non-compliance. The revised policy could help European publishers continue using commercial content partnerships without risking search penalties, while increasing the compliance and potential revenue costs for major technology platforms operating in Europe.