Last week, a federal judge ruled that tech giant Google violated antitrust laws in the U.S. through its search business.
It was a major defeat in court for Google, and could reshape how Americans get their information online, while upending the company’s dominance in the sector.
U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled that Google violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act. In her ruling, she wrote:
“After having carefully considered and weighed the witness testimony and evidence, the court reaches the following conclusion: Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly.”
Now, the Department of Justice is weighing what its options will be, which could include breaking up Google, which is owned by parent company Alphabet.
Bloomberg News reported this week that the company’s shares dropped 1.4% in extended trading.
Google almost immediately announced that it would appeal the ruling, but the DOJ is already considering what options it might take to penalize Google. That could include forcing the company to share its data with some of its competitors, and putting new measures in place that would prevent Google from gaining more of an unfair advantage in things such as AI-based tech.
Sources also told Bloomberg News that one option could include divesting Google from its Android operating system, which runs on certain mobile devices. It’s the remedy that apparently was discussed most frequently by attorneys at the DOJ, the media outlet reported.
According to the report, DOJ officials were also weighing whether they should try to force Google to sell off its AdWords program, which is a search advertising program the company runs, or its Chrome web browser.
This is all part of a major new focus of antitrust regulators to go after big tech companies they believe are being monopolistic. In the last four years alone, other lawsuits have been filed against Apple, Amazon and Meta Platforms.
Commenting on the ruling, Diana Moss, who works at the Progressive Policy Institute as its director of competition policy and vice president, said:
“This is definitely a landmark. … It’s very clear in signaling that the use of exclusive contracts in the hands of a monopolist violates the law.”
Others, though, believe the decision isn’t necessarily good for everyone. For instance, Chamber of Progress’ founder Adam Kovacevich, who is a former policy director at Google, commented:
“The biggest winner from [the] ruling isn’t consumers or little tech, it’s Microsoft. Microsoft has underinvested in search for decades, but [the] ruling opens the door to a court mandate of default deals for Bing. That’s a slap in the face to consumers who chose Google because they think it’s the best.”
Ironically, one of the people who testified during the antitrust trial against Google was Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft.
Ripple effects from this ruling are likely to be felt by other major tech companies, especially Amazon, Apple and Meta, who are all facing antitrust challenges of their own.
