A landmark antitrust case against Google concluded Friday with closing arguments from a federal judge, setting the stage for a ruling that could fundamentally change power in the tech industry.
Judge Amit P. Mehta said in the final moments of Friday's proceedings: “The importance and significance of this case is not lost on me, not just for Google but for the public.” . He thanked the lawyers who handled the case, adding: “They handed the baton to us.”
He now has to decide on a lawsuit by the Justice Department and state attorneys general that claims Google is abusing its monopoly in the search business, stifling competitors and limiting innovation. The company denies this.
During two days of closing arguments, Judge Mehta of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia did not say what sentence he planned to issue. He criticized both sides, frequently referencing testimony and evidence from last year's 10-week trial to poke holes in each side's claims. He also asked them to explain how their position fits with key case law.
As the proceedings closed on Friday, Kenneth Dinzer, the Justice Department's chief trial attorney, said that if antitrust laws cannot “thaw out” the search business dominated by Google, the company's practices will continue into the future. He claimed to be deaf.
Google's lead attorney, John E. Schmidlein, countered that a ruling in favor of the government “would be an unprecedented decision that would punish a company that won on the merits.”
Judge Mehta's ruling in the coming weeks and months comes as other government antitrust lawsuits against Apple, Amazon, and Instagram and WhatsApp owner Mehta come as U.S. regulators seek to rein in their powers. It will probably affect the fate of
The government alleges that Google illegally strengthened its search monopoly by paying billions of dollars to Apple and other technology partners to include the Google search engine in its products.
Friday's debate focused on the government's second argument, that the company also has monopoly over ads that appear in search results.
Google pointed to other companies competing in search and advertising.
“Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Amazon – all of these companies have very detailed and very useful information that gives advertisers a variety of options to reach the consumer groups they are most interested in. ” said Schmidtlein. he claimed.
Judge Mehta asked the Justice Department to explain why search ads are so different from ads on Facebook and other social platforms.
“How does that match reality?” he asked. “There's no way Facebook's advertising platform is a bad product and they're making billions of dollars off it.”
Judge Mehta also noted the success of TikTok, saying it has a “pretty good advertising platform” and is growing. He said he spent time using TikTok searches to investigate the incident.
“For the record, I do not have this app on my phone,” he added, in a nod to national security concerns about the app.
The government also said a judge should sanction Google for its policy of automatically turning off workplace chat history, arguing that the policy led to the destruction of evidence. Dinzer said a court would need to “say this is wrong” to prevent Google from suppressing evidence in the future. Google's lawyer, Colette T. Connor, denied that the company had acted improperly.
“Let me be completely frank,” Judge Mehta said. “Google's document retention policies leave a lot of room for improvement.”