The DOJ has presented more evidence in U.S. v Google, the biggest antitrust case in decades, showing that Google trained employees to avoid words and phrases that made the company “come across as monopolists.”
In the latest twist in the landmark Google antitrust trial, experts have testified that the internet giant’s default search engine settings could be manipulating user choices, a claim that could have far-reaching implications for the tech industry. One expert witness explained, “If I can move your eyes, if I can manipulate your fixations, I can manipulate your choices quite a bit.”
Apple, a company known for its secretive work culture, is upset that details of its backroom deals with Google are becoming public information through U.S. v. Google, the Department of Justice’s landmark antitrust case against the tech giant.
Chris Barton, a former Google executive, recently testified that the tech giant aggressively pushed for its search engine to be the default on mobile carriers and Android smartphones. Barton revealed that Google recognized the “massive value of mobile users relying on its search engine on early smartphones.”
The Department of Justice, along with a coalition of state attorneys general, has initiated a groundbreaking antitrust trial against tech giant Google, accusing the company of maintaining a monopoly in the search engine market through strategic barriers and “feedback loops” of paying device makers to defend its power.
Google has an argument against allegations that it maintains an illegal monopoly: the internet giant claims it is simply the best, and an overwhelming number of users choose it for that reason.
U.S. v Google, arguably the biggest antitrust case since the one brought against Microsoft in 2001, begins today.
Google has tentatively settled a contentious antitrust lawsuit concerning its Google Play Store, potentially resolving complaints from consumers and multiple state attorneys general that the internet giant used its massive power to dominate the market for Android apps.
Tech giant Apple is being sued by over 1,500 British app developers over excessive fees for access to the app store, the only means of distributing apps to iPhone users.
Alfaview, a German tech company known for its videoconferencing app, has made an antitrust complaint against Microsoft over its decision to bundle its own videoconferencing project with Office.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX has emerged as the dominant force in the rocket-launch market, handling a staggering 88 percent of customer flights from American launch sites in the first half of 2023. One former Air Force space operations officer explains, “The fact is that the competition can’t field anything right now and that makes SpaceX a de facto monopoly.”
Google has reportedly been charged with violating European Union antitrust laws. The charges, filed by EU regulators, accuse Google of leveraging its dominance in online advertising to undercut competition, marking the fourth such accusation against the company in recent years.
A federal judge has ruled against Google, finding that the Masters of the Universe intentionally destroyed evidence and providing false information to the court in a recent antitrust case. Judge James Donato stated that the internet giant tried to “to hide the ball” by destroying chat messages.
Tech giant Google has reportedly asked a U.S. judge to reject a recent antitrust complaint filed against the company by the Department of Justice.
Google has denied U.S. government allegations that it destroyed evidence necessary for an antitrust investigation by turning off its internal chat system’s “history” feature. According to the DOJ, Google executives use the chat feature so that their conversations would not be handed over to any investigation.
Google is facing its second antitrust lawsuit from the Department of Justice in two years, over its dominance in the digital ads market, which has seen the tech giant operate in both the buying and selling of ads in addition to running its ad exchange.
Britain’s antitrust regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority, has successfully forced Facebook (now known as Meta) to sell a part of its business, as global scrutiny of alleged anticompetitive practices in the tech industry continues.
Users of the Fitbit smartwatch will be required to have Google accounts next year to access some of the device’s features, following the fitness tracking company’s acquisition by Google-parent Alphabet Inc. last year.
California has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon, alleging that the company violated state competition law through its pricing rules.
According to recent reports, the U.S. Department of Justice is in the early stages of drafting an antitrust lawsuit against Apple.
The Wall Street Journal has revealed in an exclusive report that e-commerce giant Amazon has been reducing the number of items it sells under its own brands due to poor sales in recent months. The company is also facing intense regulatory pressure over its private label business, which is accused of using sales data from other brands on the Amazon platform to hijack their customer base with an inferior copy of their products.
An Amazon vice president reportedly attempted to encourage third-party merchants to reject landmark legislation challenging the power of big tech giants but was promptly rejected by many sellers who say they support the legislation.
On Thursday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Don Lemon Tonight,” Jason Furman, who served as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Barack Obama and on the Council of Economic Advisers and the National Economic Council under President Bill Clinton
Match Group, the company behind popular dating apps like Tinder and OkCupid, is suing Google, accusing the company of holding it hostage with its monopolistic stranglehold on the Android app store. The company’s lawsuit states: “Ten years ago, Match Group was Google’s partner. We are now its hostage. Blinded by the possibility of getting an ever-greater cut of the billions of dollars users spend each year on Android apps, Google set out to monopolize the market for how users pay for their Android apps.”
The DOJ has reportedly accelerated its investigation into Google and its Maps product to determine if the Masters of the Universe illegally stifle competition by bundling Maps with other Google software.
The Big Tech Masters of the Universe are facing renewed pushback as the European Union Council and European Parliament have reached a provisional political agreement on the Digital Markets Acts (DMA). The DMA will attempt to tame the anti-competitive power of tech companies like Amazon, Google, and Facebook, which the act labels as “gatekeepers.”
The Department of Justice has accused tech giant Google of training employees to hide business communications from legal review “by using false requests for legal advice.” The DOJ has informed a judge overseeing an antitrust case against the Masters of the Universe that the company trains employees to add lawyers to written communications and seek legal advice even when not required so it could invoke attorney-client privilege when documents are requested as part of an investigation.
Tech giant Google is facing another antitrust complaint filed in the EU related to the company’s digital advertising business. The European Publishers Council compares Google’s stranglehold on the digital advertising business and its built-in conflicts of interest as both ads buyer and seller to “Goldman or Citibank owning the New York Stock Exchange.”
Tech giant Google is facing yet another antitrust lawsuit, this time a suit in Europe potentially worth $2.4 billion over its online shopping service unfairly favoring the tech giant’s own offerings by “abusing its dominant position.”
35 states have commented on their support for Epic Games in its ongoing legal battle with tech giant Apple. A letter signed by dozens of state attorneys general to a California appeals court reads: Apple’s conduct has harmed and is harming mobile app-developers and millions of citizens.”
Amazon has reportedly shut down its “Sold by Amazon” program following an investigation from Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson which found that the program violated antitrust laws. The program involved Amazon setting minimum prices for certain sellers’ products and the Masters of the Universe taking a cut of anything sold at prices above the minimum. One Amazon seller commented on the program, “Almost everyone I talked to said this doesn’t seem right. Normally, when you let the foxes run the hen house, the hens get eaten.”
Epic Games has filed an opening brief to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals aiming to overturn a previous ruling that Apple’s ownership of the iOS App Store does not constitute a monopoly. According to the Fortnite developer, “Apple’s conduct is precisely what the antitrust laws prohibit.”
Apple and Google recently warned U.S. lawmakers that bipartisan antitrust legislation that aims to curb the power of the Masters of the Universe could threaten user privacy and security.
A federal judge has ruled that the FTC can move forward with its revised antitrust case against Facebook. The judge rejected Facebook’s request to dismiss the case, writing: “Although the agency may well face a tall task down the road in proving its allegations, the court believes that it has now cleared the pleading bar and may proceed to discovery.”
The United States International Trade Commission has reportedly upheld a ruling finding that Google infringed upon five audio technology patents held by speaker company Sonos.
Amazon and Google are reportedly mobilizing the small businesses that they claim rely on their platforms to fight antitrust bills that threaten to break up the Masters of the Universe. Incredibly, some small businesses are arguing that bills designed to stop Amazon from copying their products and destroying their business by favoring the platform’s own brand would be a net negative for their companies.
A new class-action lawsuit alleges that Apple and Google have an agreement that keeps the iPhone maker out of the search engine business as long as Google pays to remain the default search option in Apple’s Safari browser. The lawsuit claims the two companies maintain their anticompetitive agreement with “regular secret meetings” between Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Apple CEO Tim Cook.
Leaked internal documents reportedly reveal tech giant Facebook’s opinions on rival platforms like TikTok and YouTube. Mark Zuckerberg’s internet giant is plainly interested in targeting rival platforms as “inspiration” for future features, a favorite strategy of Facebook enabled by its massive power over the market.
An appeals court has put a pause on the ongoing case between Epic and Apple, placing a stay on the enforcement of an injunction issued by the lower court. Based on the ruling, Apple can maintain its current purchase system as the sole source of in-app payments on iPhones, despite previous rulings stating that the exclusive agreement was illegal.
Italy’s competition authority announced on Thursday that it has fined Amazon roughly $1.3 billion (€1.129 billion), alleging that the company “has harmed competing operators” by abusing its dominant market position and pushing third-party sellers to use Amazon’s logistics service Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA).
