A US judge has ruled Google acted illegally to maintain a monopoly on online searches.
They said the tech giant paid tens of millions of dollars annually to ensure its search engine was the default on smartphones and browsers.
After reviewing reams of evidence that included testimony from senior executives at Google, Microsoft and Apple during last year’s 10-week trial, US District Judge Amit Mehta issued his decision after the two sides presented their closing arguments in May.
“After having carefully considered and weighed the witness testimony and evidence, the court reaches the following conclusion: Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Judge Mehta wrote in his 277-page ruling.
He said Google’s dominance in the search market is evidence of its monopoly.
Google “enjoys an 89.2% share of the market for general search services, which increases to 94.9% on mobile devices”, the ruling said.
It represents a major setback for Google and its parent, Alphabet, which had argued that its popularity stemmed from consumers’ overwhelming desire to use a search engine so good at what it does that it has become synonymous with looking things up online.
Google’s search engine processes an estimated 8.5 billion queries per day worldwide, nearly doubling its daily volume from 12 years ago, according to a recent study from the investment firm BOND.
Google still faces other legal threats in the US and abroad. In September, a federal trial is scheduled to begin in Virginia over the Justice Department’s allegations that Google’s advertising technology constitutes an illegal monopoly.
It's parent company Alphabet says it will appeal the decision in a process that may land in the Supreme Court.
