Four years after the US Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google, the judge presiding over the case ruled: “Google is a monopolist and acted as one to maintain its monopoly.”
Judge Amit Mehta of the US District Court for the District of Columbia ruled on Monday that Google violated Section 2 of the Sherman Antitrust Act, which makes anticompetitive behavior illegal. The ruling challenged Google’s multi-billion dollar deals with Apple, Samsung and Mozilla to make their search engine the default for their products, calling the partnership “exclusive” and “anti-competitive”. 
Judge Amit Mehta of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
Although Google said it plans to appeal the decision, the case represents an important turning point, according to Damian Rollison, director of AI marketing at SOCi.
“(This) decision represents the most concrete signal yet that antitrust actions may ultimately affect Google’s business and the role the company plays in the lives of so many consumers,” Rollison told Entrepreneur.
Rollinson added that he doesn’t think Google’s search dominance of more than 90% of the global market bothers most people, but that dominance is now under threat. Google is facing AI competitors like Perplexity and OpenAI’s SearchGPT with their own legal challenges. There have also been user complaints about the poor quality of Google searches.
“Google has argued and will argue that its dominance is due to product superiority,” Rollison said. “That was true in its early stages of growth to become a leading search engine, but it’s probably not such a defensible position anymore.”
Rollison said Google has historically favored itself and its own services in search results.
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“When was the last time you visited a special website to find the meaning of a word?” Rollison asked.
Search results, which provide information and answers to questions about travel, shopping and places, “are provided directly by Google on Google-owned search sites with Google-owned properties that are monetized through the placement of Google-owned ads,” he said.
The world of Google’s self-referential search could change because of the ruling: The tech giant will have to separate its search from ads, for example, according to Rollinson. Since the appeal and penalty have not yet been decided, it may be months before we know how this court decision will affect Google.
Still, the ruling sets a precedent for pending Justice Department antitrust cases against Big Tech companies, including one against Apple.
Related: I Worked at Google for 14 Years – Here’s What I Had to Unlearn When I Started My Own Company