Google Illegally Maintained Search Monopoly, Judge Rules in Siding With DOJ

Google broke the law by inking multibillion-dollar deals to make its search engine the default on web browsers and smartphones including devices from Apple and Samsung, a federal judge ruled Monday.

Judge Amit Mehta of U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said Google’s payments to partners — estimated to be more than $26 billion in 2021 — effectively blocked any other search-engine competitor from succeeding in the market. In a 277-page ruling Monday (available at this link), he wrote that Google had abused its monopoly in the internet search business.

“Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Judge Mehta wrote in the ruling. The internet giant violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act “by maintaining its monopoly in two product markets in the United States — general search services and general text advertising — through its exclusive distribution agreements.”

The decision Monday did not include remedies for Google’s behavior. The judge will next decide what those will be — including potentially forcing it to alter business practices or even ordering a breakup of Google’s businesses.

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In 2020, the Justice Department, joined by several state attorneys general, filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google, alleging that the company had a virtual monopoly on search and search advertising to the detriment of consumers and competitors. In its lawsuit, the DOJ sought an injunction to stop Google from engaging in anticompetitive behavior as well as “structural relief as needed to cure any anticompetitive harm.”

Discovery in the antitrust case against Google began in December 2020 and concluded in March 2023. The D.C. district court held a nine-week bench trial starting in September 2023. After “receiving extensive post-trial submissions,” the court held closing arguments over two days in early May 2024, before Judge Mehta’s Aug. 5 ruling.

Google has “monopoly power” for general search services and general search text ads and its distribution agreements are “exclusive and have anticompetitive effects,” the judge wrote in the ruling. “Google has not offered valid procompetitive justifications for those agreements. Importantly, the court also finds that Google has exercised its monopoly power by charging supracompetitive prices for general search text ads. That conduct has allowed Google to earn monopoly profits.”