According to a court document, the United States Department of Justice is currently reviewing numerous potential remedies, including asking a federal judge to dissolve Google following its omnipresent search engine being deemed an unlawful monopoly.
In court documents submitted late Tuesday, attorneys representing the government detailed a range of possible remedies that could be pursued. These include limiting the ways in which Google’s AI crawls the web for search results and prohibiting the company from paying companies like Apple billions of dollars yearly to guarantee that Google is the default search engine displayed to users on devices like iPhones.
A legal battle that might change a firm forever associated with internet search began on Tuesday with the first of several filings over the next several months.
In their filing, the antitrust regulators mentioned how Google has dominated popular distribution channels for almost a decade, which has made rivals less motivated to fight for users. “To adequately address these harms, we must take action now to end Google’s distribution control and tomorrow we must ensure that Google cannot control distribution.”
In August, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled that Google had been unlawfully abusing its dominance in the search engine industry to limit competition and innovation. He intends to make a decision by August 2025 and has laid out a schedule for a trial on the suggested cures next spring.
For the first time, the government has indicated its intended remedies in the court submission; yet, given the careful approach mandated by Mehta, the government may decide not to pursue remedies such as divestment in the end.
Next month, the Justice Department will submit a more comprehensive proposal after conducting discovery in the upcoming weeks.
In reaction to the document, Google VP of regulatory relations Lee-Anne Mulholland stated that the DOJ was “already signaling requests that go far beyond the specific legal issues” pertaining to this case. “American innovation and consumers may suffer unintended consequences due to government overreach in a fast-moving industry.”
Google has previously stated its intention to challenge Mehta’s verdict; however, the internet giant will have to hold up till he completes a remedy before taking legal action. Former chief economist for the Justice Department’s antitrust section and current Cornell University law professor George Hay estimates that the appeals process might take up to five years.
Much of the evidence presented during the protracted trial in Washington focused on agreements Google struck with other tech companies to guarantee that Google is the default search engine on consumer electronics. To secure those default agreements, Google reportedly spent over $26 billion in 2021, as revealed in trial testimony.
Therefore, whether Google would be prohibited from making such acquisitions has been the subject of much debate over possible remedies. The distribution deals were described by attorneys as a “starting point for addressing Google’s unlawful conduct” in Tuesday’s petition.
So, the government agency has stated that it is contemplating calling for systemic reforms to prevent Google from using its products—including the Chrome browser, Android OS, artificial intelligence (AI) offerings, and app store—to advance its search business.
In his letter, Mulholland revealed that Google had spent billions on Chrome and Android. “Splitting them up would cause a shift in their business strategies, which in turn would drive up device prices and weaken Android and Google Play’s ability to compete with Apple’s iPhone and App Store.”
The government has also considered a plan that would let businesses choose not to have their data used by Google to provide users with search results that have been boosted with artificial intelligence.
Government lawyers expressed concerns about Google’s capacity to use its monopolistic position to feed AI features, stating that this might further entrench Google’s dominance and create barriers to competition.
In response to a blog post, Google said that AI is a new technology with a lot of potential but is also seeing intense market rivalry.
“The government’s intervention in this crucial industry carries significant risks,” Mulholland said.
Next month, the government will lay out its whole plan to address Google’s anticompetitive activities. In December, Google will provide its own suggestions for fixing the issue. The prosecution will next submit its last recommendation in March 2025.
European Union antitrust officials have also hinted that dismantling Google is the only option to appease competition worries regarding its digital advertising business, adding to the growing regulatory pressure Google is under on both sides of the Atlantic.
As a form of punishment for Google’s illegal monopoly in the Android app store, a federal judge ordered the company to open it to competition on Monday. Furthermore, a federal judge in Virginia is considering whether Google has an unlawful monopoly on the technology used for online advertising.
