A judge ruled on Tuesday that Google would not be forced to sell its Chrome browser or the Android operating system, saving the tech giant from the most severe penalties sought by the US government. The same judge had ruled in favor of US prosecutors nearly a year ago, finding that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly with its namesake search engine.
Groups critical of Google’s dominance in the internet search and online advertising industry are furious. They contend the judge missed an opportunity to enact meaningful change in an industry that has suffocated under the crushing weight of its heaviest player. Tech industry groups and investors, by contrast, are thrilled. Shares in Alphabet, Google’s parent company, have risen 9% since Tuesday afternoon.
Judge Amit Mehta did order Google to share data from its search engine with its rivals. He also enjoined the company from entering or maintaining exclusive contracts relating to the distribution of its products including Chrome, Google Assistant and the Gemini app. That penalty will not, however, prevent it from paying distributors such as Apple and Mozilla, which use Google as the default search engine for their respective browsers. Google faces a separate hearing later this year on its monopoly over online advertising technology.
The Department of Justice celebrated the ruling in a Tuesday press release that called Mehta’s proposed remedies “significant”.
“The court’s ruling today recognizes the need for remedies that will pry open the market for general search services, which has been frozen in place for over a decade,” the announcement reads.
It’s not enough, say free market advocates.
Critics say judge handed Google a lenient win
Mehta’s decision resulted in an immediate wave of backlash from big tech critics who have been closely following the antitrust case for years. Many of these thinktanks and advocacy groups had long called for Google to be broken up for its monopolistic tactics, arguing that forceful action was needed to restore meaningful competition.
Instead of opening up the online search industry, however, critics of the ruling allege that it will now retrench Google’s dominance while setting a precedent that big tech need not fear serious consequences for breaking the law.
“Google for years has wielded its vast power over all layers of the digital economy to crush competitors, halt innovation and rob Americans of their right to read, watch and buy what they want without being manipulated by one of the most powerful corporations in human history,” Barry Lynn, executive director at the Open Markets Institute thinktank, said. “Judge Mehta’s order that Google share search data with competitors and cease entering into exclusive contracts does nothing to right those wrongs. Instead, it lets Google and every other monopolist know that even the most egregious violation of law will be met with a slap on the wrist.”
Some groups and experts took issue with how Mehta’s ruling that Google had illegally maintained a monopoly could result in the more lenient decision handed down this week.
“You don’t find someone guilty of robbing a bank and then sentence him to writing a thank you note for the loot,” said Nidhi Hegde, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project non-profit.
Several tech leaders, including the CEOs of Yelp, search engine DuckDuckGo and Epic Games, additionally condemned the decision for failing to adequately level the playing field for competitors. Yelp and Epic Games have both sued Google over antitrust issues, while DuckDuckGo’s CEO testified in the government’s antitrust trial against the search giant.
“It’s like a defendant robbed a series of banks and the court verdict found them guilty, then sentenced them to probation under which they may continue robbing banks but must share data on how they rob banks with competing bank robbers,” Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, posted on X in yet another use of a bank robbing analogy.
Democratic lawmakers who have urged for stronger regulations on big tech similarly denounced the ruling, in some cases calling for the justice department to appeal the decision.
“The court previously ruled that Google’s search business is an illegal monopoly, but now the judge’s remedies fail to hold Google accountable for breaking the law,” the Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren said in a statement. “Instead of restoring competition and ending Google’s dominance, this ruling is a slap on the wrist for unlawful behavior that warranted the breakup of this tech giant.”
The chairs of the Monopoly Busters caucus – US representatives Chris Deluzio, Pramila Jayapal, Pat Ryan and Angie Craig – also issued a statement calling the decision a “slap on the wrist” and alleging it undermines bipartisan efforts to rein in tech monopolies.
“In practice, this ruling allows Google to stay a monopoly. Despite finding Google guilty of search monopolization, the court is allowing the company to retain Chrome and Android, key tools that Google uses to dominate the market,” the caucus said.
The decision also drew the ire of human rights group Amnesty International, which said that Google’s business model is built on “pervasive surveillance” and that Chrome is an important tool used for harvesting the personal data of Google users.
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“Forcing Google to break up its search business and sell Chrome could have marked a first step toward a digital world that respects our rights,” said Agnès Callamard, secretary general of Amnesty International.
Silicon Valley and Wall Street cheer
While trustbusters lamented the ruling, the tech industry cheered. Industry groups weighed in saying Mehta’s decision avoided calamitous results for Silicon Valley. The Developers Alliance, a tech industry group, said it was pleased that the judge “rejected the draconian structural remedies” that the justice department had requested in the case.
“Divesting Chrome and Android would have had disastrous consequences for web and app developers and the broader digital ecosystem,” the group said in a statement. “Developers are relieved that the political theater of this trial has ended.”
Another industry group, the Consumer Choice Center, invoked Google’s arguments from the trial in which the search engine giant said it had the best product and that is why it dominates the market. Stephen Kent, the group’s media director, said the justice department’s “politicized case” held “larger players in contempt for having superior products that people freely use instead of rival apps and services”.
Many of these groups cited Mehta’s argument that in the year or so since he originally ruled that Google’s search business was monopolistic, the burgeoning AI space has produced both financially and technologically viable competitors to Chrome for the first time in years. “These new realities give the court hope that Google will not simply outbid competitors for distribution if superior competitors emerge,” Mehta’s ruling read.
“Arguing about search engine market share when dramatic and remarkable advances in AI were upending the industry was head-scratching at best,” the Developers Alliance said.
Jennifer Huddleston, senior fellow at libertarian thinktank the Cato Institute, said the courts should proceed with caution and “recognize that innovation often remains our best competition policy” when attempting to rule on antitrust cases.
“The months that have passed between the initial ruling and the remedies decision have shown how rapidly markets in the tech sector can change,” Hiddleston said in a statement. “This is particularly true in the present, given the disruptive nature of AI products in search. As Judge Mehta’s decision notes, such cases ask courts to predict the future of a rapidly changing market rather than merely look at historical facts, as it typically does, and that doing such is not a judge’s forte.”
As Google’s stock bounced on the news of Mehta’s ruling, Apple also saw a boost. The iPhone maker historically received billions of dollars from Google annually to make Google Search the default engine on its phones and tablets. The deal between the two companies amounted to about 15% of Apple’s operating income. Its shares rose nearly 4% since Tuesday.
“Apple also gets a nice win because the ruling forces Google to renegotiate the search deal annually,” Gene Munster, managing partner at Deepwater Asset Management, wrote on X.
Critics of the remedies ruling were not surprised by Wall Street heralding Mehta’s decision as a win. “There’s a reason Google’s stock jumped after this ruling was released,” said Christo Wilson, a Northeastern University computer science professor who has conducted research on Google’s monopoly. “It is a historic misfire that fails to meet the enormity of the finding that Google is a monopolist in online search.”
