D.C. Judge Chips Away at Google for "Monopolist" Search Engine

WASHINGTON -- A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled last week that Google illegally exerts monopolistic power over the internet in a ruling likely to severely impact the industry giant’s business.

Judge Amit P. Mehta wrote that Google’s distribution agreements for its general search service and text advertising violate Section 2 of the Sherman Antitrust Act.

The lawsuit that led to the ruling in U.S. District Court was filed by the Justice Department and state attorneys general in one of several challenges to Big Tech.

The Justice Department argues in similar lawsuits against Amazon, Apple and Meta that the market power of Big Tech has reached a point that the companies no longer serve the public interest.

The Justice Department said that by paying other companies, like Apple and Samsung, billions of dollars a year to have Google installed as the default search engine on smartphones and web browsers, the internet company violated antitrust law.

Google controls about 90 percent of the online search market. For smartphones, it has about 95 percent of the search engine market.

The government attorneys said the contracts prevented meaningful competition. Google disagreed, saying users could easily switch their default search engines whenever they wanted.

Judge Mehta agreed with the Justice Department, writing in his 277-page ruling, “Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly.”

Although users could switch their default search engines, Google’s contracts and market dominance deprive other search engines of realistic chances for competition, Mehta said.

Google paid $26.3 billion in 2021 for first place settings as the default on smartphones and browsers.

"The default is extremely valuable real estate," Mehta wrote. "Even if a new entrant were positioned from a quality standpoint to bid for the default when an agreement expires, such a firm could compete only if it were prepared to pay partners upwards of billions of dollars in revenue share and make them whole for any revenue shortfalls resulting from the change."

Google parent company Alphabet said it would appeal the ruling. "This decision recognizes that Google offers the best search engine, but concludes that we shouldn’t be allowed to make it easily available," Google said in a statement.

The ruling won praise from the Biden administration. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the "pro-competition ruling is a victory for the American people."

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