The extreme caution of French investigators face Google – Le Figaro

For a year, members of the financial national parquet worked on the tax fraud case without an Internet connection, using only a word processor.

the french services took extreme precautions to maintain strict confidentiality about the tax evasion investigation against Google in France. For nearly a year, investigators “worked out this folder only network offline (…), with a computer, but only in word processor,” said on Sunday the director of national financial parquet (PNF) Eliane Houlette, during the Great Rendezvous Europe 1 / I-Tele / Le Monde. In order not to arouse suspicion, the set was “never to utter the name Google” and use the code name “Tulip”, associated with the operation.

Faced with Google, the France is engaged in a battle on all fronts. Legal, first. The investigation, opened June 16, 2015 following a complaint from the French tax authorities, but remained secret until Tuesday, covers the period 2007 to 2011. It aims to verify whether the company Google Ireland Ltd had while a permanent establishment in France “and if, by not declaring a part of his activity carried out on french territory, it has violated its tax obligations.” “Several terabytes of data” were recovered by investigators during the searches conducted at the headquarters of Google France in Paris on Tuesday.

The standoff is also media. Google enjoys in France as elsewhere, an excellent reputation, thanks to its affordable and efficient products, known to many. Invariably, the company states “respect French law and cooperate fully with the authorities to answer their questions.” Search and repeated accusations of tax evasion souçons may end up giving the image of a fiercely against the US group.

Created in the aftermath of the Cahuzac affair, does not have the same sympathy capital, or in the same punching power. It’s “a little David against Goliath”, claimed Sunday its director, to present his case. The exploitation of the data entered, which could take “several months” or even “many years” could go “much faster” if investigators had at their disposal the most “successful”, Eliane Houlette regretted. The volume to be analyzed is “at least as important as Panama Papers perhaps even more,” she added. A comparison, unflattering, to mark the spirits.

The third fight is political. In an interview Sunday with Reuters and three European newspapers, the finance minister, Michel Sapin, warned that France would go “to the end” in this case Google, one of the most successful American entrepreneurial Web. “There will be no negotiations, we apply the law,” he said, ruling out any idea of ​​agreement, such as happened with the British tax authorities, covering about 172 million euros. The amount of this adjustment had controversy in Britain. In France, the tax authorities would demand 1.6 billion to Google.

(with AFP and Reuters)