Google is an illegal monopoly, federal court rules

A federal court has found that Google illegally abused its market power to quash competition in internet search, handing the Justice Department a landmark victory against Big Tech.

“Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Judge Amit P. Mehta wrote in his judgment on Monday.

Mehta wrote that Google, a unit of Alphabet Inc., has violated Section 2 of the Sherman Antitrust Act by maintaining its monopoly in two product markets in the United States – general search service and general text advertising – through exclusive distribution agreements with customer companies.

The case has been closely watched in antitrust law circles as the first of a string of cases federal prosecutors have launched against high-tech giants. Antitrust enforcers argue that Big Tech has gotten too powerful and doesn’t serve the public interest. Lawsuits have also been filed against Amazon, Meta and Apple.

The Justice Department asserted that Google violated federal antitrust law by forging contracts that require Google to be installed as the default search engine on Android smartphones, among other practices that prevented its rivals from competing on an even playing field.

Google argued that users were free to switch their default search engine, and that it is easy to do so.

The Justice Department and Google did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Monday.

The case, U.S. et al v. Google, was filed in 2020 under the Trump administration, and prosecutors in the Biden administration’s Justice Department took it to court in September 2023.

The nine-week trial at the E. Barrett Prettyman Courthouse in Washington saw appearances by senior industry executives, including Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Apple executives John Giannandrea and Eduardo Cue, to testify about why other major tech companies have struggled to launch competitive rivals to Google search.

The trial and Mehta’s ruling concerned only the question of whether Google violated antitrust laws. A separate proceeding will determine what remedies should be applied to increase competition in the search market.

A separate Justice Department antitrust lawsuit against Google, focused on its advertising technology, is awaiting trial in federal court in Virginia.

Google is also facing antitrust scrutiny in other jurisdictions, including in the European Union, where antitrust regulators announced in March investigations into the company and others under the new Digital Markets Act, a new anti-monopoly law aimed at internet giants.