Lawsuit: Google and Apple Conspire to Maintain Stranglehold on Search Market

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.

MacRumors reports that according to a new class-action lawsuit, Apple has an agreement with Google to not enter the search engine business as long as Google continues to pay to remain the default search option in Safari.

Earlier this week, a class-action lawsuit was filed in a California court against Apple, Google, and the company’s CEOs. The lawsuit claims that the companies have a non-compete agreement in relation to online search that violates U.S. antitrust laws.

The complaint alleges that Apple CEO Tim Cook and Google CEO Sundar Pichai have been participating in “regular secret meetings” in which Google has agreed to share a portion of its profits with Apple as long as its search engine is given preferential treatment on devices like the Apple iPhone and iPad.

The lawsuit alleges that Google pays Apple multi-billion-dollar payments based on an agreement that Apple won’t launch its own search engine, and that the non-compete contract outlines plans to undermine smaller competitors and acquire others.The complaint alleges that advertising rates are higher than rates would in a competitive system also.

The lawsuit is seeking an injunction prohibiting the non-compete agreement between Google and Apple, all multi-billion dollar payments cease immediately, and the profit-sharing agreement and preferential treatment are ended.

The complaint further calls for “the breakup of Google into separate and independent companies and the breakup of Apple into separate and independent companies in accordance with the precedent of the breakup of Standard Oil company into Exxon, Mobile, Conoco, Amoco, Sohio, Chevron, and others.”

Lawyer Joseph M Alioto, who filed the antitrust case in San Francisco this week, stated: “These powerful companies abused their size by unlawfully foreclosing and monopolizing major markets which in an otherwise free enterprise system would have created jobs, lowered prices, increased production, added new competitors, encouraged innovations, and increased the quality of services in the digital age.”

Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or contact via secure email at the address lucasnolan@protonmail.com