Google filed appeals with the General Court of the European Union on Tuesday, challenging two Digital Markets Act decisions that would require the company to hand user search history to third parties by January 2027 and modify Android by July 2027.

The company announced the action at the bloc's second-highest court, targeting a DMA designation process that Google argues threatens privacy and weakens Android security.

What does the appeal actually target?

Google's filing contests two separate EU decisions. The first set a January 2027 deadline for sharing search query data with "authorized third parties," a category the original June mandate defined to include rewards platforms and companies offering personalized discount codes.

The second decision imposed a July 2027 deadline for Android-related changes Google has not detailed publicly. The DMA's penalty structure gives the EU significant leverage: fines of up to 10% of annual global revenue, up to 20% for repeated infringements, and periodic penalty payments capped at 5% of average daily sales.

What is Google saying in its defense?

"We're appealing decisions that will force us to share people's private search history without sufficient anonymization and weaken vital security protections on Android," Oliver Bethell, Google's senior director of competition, said in a statement.

Nick Fox, SVP of Knowledge & Information at Google, expanded on the privacy argument in a recent interview. Fox said the DMA requirement "is about to cause a really massive violation of European privacy," arguing that the mandated recipients "could be any number of companies, and they're actually typically not European companies."

Fox added: "The questions you bring to Search are the most private questions you ask anyone. You bring to Search questions that you don't ask your spouse, you don't ask your friends, you don't ask your doctor. These are very private questions about your health, your finances, any number of things."

What user-facing changes triggered the dispute?

The June mandate ordered Google to let users port their search data to authorized third-party services. The original EU logic treats user portability as a competition tool: if a rewards platform can import a user's query history, it can offer personalized offers the user would otherwise see only inside Google's own properties.

Google counters that recipients of the mandated data transfers sit outside Google's own data-center security perimeter. "Once those queries are taken outside of Google and handed over to others, they're subject to hacking and any number of things," Fox said.

How does the appeal connect to Google's licensing program?

Google recently opened a separate licensing dataset program that allows third parties to apply for query data access under commercial terms the company controls. Google has not stated publicly whether the licensing program would satisfy the EU's DMA data-sharing requirements.

The appeal does not pause the underlying deadlines. EU courts typically rule on DMA challenges within 18 to 24 months, which would place a potential General Court decision in late 2026 at the earliest, possibly after the January 2027 compliance date already takes effect.

What should the search industry monitor next?

Watch for the General Court's interim measures request, which Google may file to suspend the January 2027 deadline while the substantive case proceeds. Track participation in Google's licensing dataset program, since licensee volume will signal whether the commercial alternative draws the third-party interest the EU intended to unlock.