Google agreed to pay $500 million in the United States, one of the biggest penalty of its kind in the U.S., to close an investigation related to permission for the Canadian pharmacies to promote their products on its website.
The amount represents revenue to Google from the advertisements of Canadian pharmacies and the proceeds of these sales in the U.S., the Justice Department announced.
Google previously created a provision in this amount for a possible agreement on advertising practices.
The offending advertisements led to illegal imports of drugs from Canada to the U.S., controlled and uncontrolled, which are sold by prescription.
Canada has its own regulations on prescription drugs, but Canadian pharmacies that sell such products to the U.S. residents are not required to comply.
Many of these pharmacies sell drugs from other countries than Canada, without an adequate pharmaceutical legislation, the Justice Department announced.
Google agreed for some time to the advertising from pharmacies abroad, but then restricted these ads to the U.S. and Canada.
The company announced in February 2010 that it prohibits ads on Canadian pharmacies selling prescription drugs to the United States.