At the start of the largest U.S. antitrust trial in a quarter-century, the Department of Justice alleged that Google had used its control of the internet search industry to exclude rivals and stifle innovation.
According to Kenneth Dintzer, the primary counsel for the Justice Department, this lawsuit is about the future of the internet and whether Google’s search engine will ever face significant competition.
Federal attorneys and state attorneys general will make an effort over the next 10 weeks to show that Google rigged the market in its favor by making its search engine the default option in a variety of locations and devices. Before the start of next year, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta probably won’t make a decision. If he finds Google in violation of the law, a second trial will be held to determine what actions should be taken to control the Mountain View, California-based business.
Top executives from Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google, and other significant technology
firms are also anticipated to testify. Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, who took over for Google co-founder Larry Page four years ago, is most certainly one of them. Additionally, according to court filings, senior Apple executive Eddy Cue may be called to testify.
Almost three years ago, during the Trump administration, the Justice Department sued Google for antitrust violations, claiming that the firm had abused its dominant position in internet search to obtain an unfair advantage over rivals. Government lawyers claim that Google pays billions of dollars each year to be the default search engine on the iPhone and on web browsers like Apple’s Safari and Mozilla’s Firefox, protecting its trademark through a kind of payola.
According to Dintzer, Google spends more than $10 billion annually on these privileged jobs.
“Google’s contracts ensure that rivals cannot match the search quality ad monetization, especially on phones,” he claimed. This wheel has been turning through this feedback loop for more than 12 years. Google always wins out in these situations.
Despite controlling nearly 90% of the market for online searches, Google responds that it is up against a lot of competition. The company claims that its competitors include websites like Yelp and Amazon, where users may ask inquiries about what to buy or where to go, as well as search engines like Microsoft’s Bing.
According to John Schmidtlein, a lawyer at the legal firm Williams & Connolly, which is representing Google, “There are many ways users access the web other than default search engines, and people use them all the time.” However, as more searches are processed by Google, the more data it gathers, which can then be used to enhance future searches and give it an even greater competitive advantage, according to Dintzer.
“User data is the oxygen for a search engine,” he declared. Since it controls the majority of the market, “Google search and ad products are better than its rivals can hope to be.” He claimed that this is the reason Google spends so much money to have its search engine set as the default on goods made by Apple and other businesses.
Dintzer said that Google “began weaponizing defaults” more than 15 years ago, citing an internal Google document that referred to its setup as an “Achilles Heel” for competing search engines provided by Yahoo and MSN. Additionally, he claimed that in exchange for revenue sharing, Google coerced Apple into placing its search engine as the default on its products.
“This is not a negotiation,” Dintzer declared. Take it or leave it, Google is saying.
Plaintiffs contend that the firm’s anticompetitive practices hindered Apple from creating a unique search engine.
Dintzer further claimed that Google attempted to conceal some documents under the attorney-client privilege while deleting others to keep them out of court proceedings.
For years, they destroyed documents, Dintzer claimed. In order to remake history in this court, “they turned history off, your honor.”
According to Google, ongoing updates to its search engine are the reason why users almost reflexively return to it, a behavior that has long since rendered the term “Googling” synonymous with doing research online. Schmidtlein claimed that Google’s modifications simply improved its search over significant rival Bing.
They lost in the market at every pivotal moment, he claimed.
The trial starts just a few weeks after the first investment in Google, a $100,000 cheque made by Andy Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, that allowed Larry Page and Sergey Brin to launch their company in a Silicon Valley garage.
A network of digital services centered by a search engine that processes billions of queries a day generates $224 billion in annual ad sales, which account for the majority of Alphabet’s $1.7 trillion market value and 182,000 employee count.
The antitrust complaint brought by the Justice Department is similar to the one it brought against Microsoft in 1998. Just as the Internet was beginning to gain traction, regulators accused Microsoft of pressuring computer manufacturers that relied on its dominant Windows operating system to include Microsoft’s Internet Explorer as well. This bundling method effectively eliminated Netscape’s once-dominant browser competitors.
Dintzer and other team members from the Justice Department’s Google case probe also contributed to the Microsoft inquiry.
If the trial results in concessions that weaken Google’s authority, it might be hindered. One possibility is that the business may be compelled to stop paying Apple and other businesses to have Google set as the default search engine on desktops and mobile devices.
Or Google might become distracted by the legal conflict. After Microsoft’s antitrust battle with the Justice Department, that is what transpired. Distracted, the software behemoth found it difficult to adjust to the effects of cell phones and internet searches. Google took advantage of the diversion to transform from a small startup into a formidable force.
