What Google plans to do about online search antitrust decision | Explained Premium

Google said it will appeal an antitrust decision aimed at making competition in the online search market fair.

The story so far: On May 31, Google said it will appeal an antitrust decision aimed at making competition in the online search market fair. Google’s reaction to the decision comes a day after U.S. Judge Amit Mehta heard closing arguments in a trial that sought to curtail the tech giant’s illegal monopoly in online search. While the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) proposed stringent remedies to bring about fair competition, Google is opposed to these measures. Judge Mehta is expected to deliver his decision soon, which could potentially unravel Google’s position as a dominant player in the online search business.

The DOJ hit Google with multiple legal challenges in recent years, alleging violations of antitrust laws, and the monopolisation of multiple markets the search giant operates in.

In particular, the regulator scrutinised Google’s revenue sharing agreements with partners like Apple over worries that the search giant’s rivals’ services are being locked out of the market and that customers are seeing reduced choices for search engines on their devices.

In August 2024, however, Judge Mehta handed the DOJ a victory when he ruled that Google was an illegal monopolist with monopoly power in the general search services and general search text advertising markets. The Google Search Remedies trial that followed this year saw the DOJ presenting a series of far-reaching proposals to cut down Google’s monopoly power, while Google presented its own list of far milder proposals.

The DOJ and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) are regulators that both work to ensure that companies, including Big Tech firms, are complying with American antitrust laws to enable fair competition. While the two regulators coordinate their efforts, the U.S. DOJ has the power to obtain criminal sanctions and has sole antitrust jurisdiction across industries including telecommunications, banks, railroads, and airlines.

One of the key topics in Google’s Search Remedies trial is the Big Tech company’s multi-billion dollar deals with telecom device manufacturers to offer Google services via their products. To bring about fairer competition, the U.S. DOJ suggested the forced sale of the Chrome browser, possible divestment of the Android platform, temporary restrictions on some of Google’s market activities, and the creation of a ‘Technical Committee’ to oversee Google’s compliance measures.

Google has consistently defended the quality and innovation of its products, while denying that it stifled competition. The tech giant strongly criticised the DOJ’s remedies to reduce its dominance, claiming that data-sharing with rivals would put customers at risk and that giving up Chrome and Android would lead to cybersecurity risks as well as increased device costs.