Google covertly funded research that defends the company's practices

(Image credit: BERTRAND GUAY/AFP/Getty Images)

published 11 July 2017

A Wall Street Journal investigation published Tuesday revealed that Google has a track record of financing research papers that it's then surfaced to defend itself, in some cases in potential legal battles:

Google has paid professors whose papers, for instance, declared that the collection of consumer data was a fair exchange for its free services; that the company didn't use its market dominance to improperly steer users to Google's commercial sites or its advertisers; and that it hasn't unfairly quashed competitors. Several papers argued that Google's search engine should be allowed to link to books and other intellectual property that authors and publishers say should be paid for. [The Wall Street Journal]

Since 2009, Google has funded an estimated 100 papers "on public-policy matters," the Journal reported. The tech giant has paid academic researchers "stipends of $5,000 to $400,000" and even read over papers before they were published, offering up suggestions. At some points, Google officials dreamed up "wish lists of academic papers that included working titles, abstracts, and budgets for each proposed paper — then they searched for willing authors," the Journal reported.