The federal judge who ruled Google was a monopolist in search is weighing his options to fix the monopoly. Here’s what happens now.
Google said on Friday that a federal judge needed to do very little to fix its search monopoly.
The company proposed offering more options to the companies that contract with it to be the automatic search engine. That could mean more options for consumers as they browse the web or use a smartphone running Google’s Android smartphone operating system. The suggestions followed a federal judge’s landmark decision in August that found the Silicon Valley company had violated antitrust laws.
Last month, the U.S. government proposed forcing Google to sell Chrome, the world’s most popular web browser, among other measures.
The judge, Amit P. Mehta of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, is expected to decide how to address Google’s search monopoly by August. His ruling could cause enormous ripple effects, potentially reshaping the internet.
Here’s what to expect.
Why does Google face a breakup?
The Justice Department and several states sued Google in 2020, accusing it of illegally protecting its monopoly over internet search and search advertising.
Google for years had paid companies including Apple, Samsung and Mozilla billions of dollars to be the automatic search engine on smartphones and web browsers. The government said these contracts were designed to entrench Google’s dominance and make it harder for rivals to compete.
Google’s ironclad hold over online search allowed it to gather more data from users, which then made its product better and harder for rivals to dislodge, Justice Department lawyers argued during a 10-week trial last year.