Judge approves partial continued use of Google Chrome while imposing additional penalties in antitrust case

In a landmark decision, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta has ruled against ordering Google to sell off its browser, Chrome, in the antitrust case brought against the tech giant by the Department of Justice (DOJ) in 2020. The case centres around the DOJ's argument that Google had used exclusive agreements with device makers to give its search engine a prime position.

However, Mehta did order Google to end exclusive deals that make Google the default search engine on phones and other devices. This decision could pave the way for smaller competitors to build their own search engines and compete with Google more effectively.

Google agreed to roll back its exclusive search engine contracts, but objected to the prospect of sharing its search data, such as user click data and search queries. The judge, recognising the potential value of this data, called on Google to share some of its search data with third parties.

Google's CEO, Sundar Pichai, testified in court, stating that the DOJ's proposals were "so far-reaching, so extraordinary" that it was akin to the government asking for a sell-off of the company's core intellectual property. Google's vice president of regulatory affairs wrote that the judge did not order a sell-off of Chrome, which "would have gone beyond the case's focus on search distribution, and would have harmed consumers and our partners."

The technology company proposed as a potential buyer of Chrome in the antitrust indictment against Google is Microsoft. Another AI competitor, Perplexity, announced its interest in buying Chrome for $34.5 billion weeks before Mehta issued his decision.

The remedies phase of the trial began this April, with both sides facing off over what price Google should pay for its monopoly. The DOJ argued for a remedy that could nip a potential Google AI monopoly in the bud and that would address all ways users access Google search.

The DOJ argued throughout the remedies phase of the trial that Google could use its artificial intelligence products, like the Gemini AI chatbot, to strengthen its monopoly in online search and to become dominant in the emerging AI space. In his ruling, Judge Mehta wrote that competition is plentiful in the AI space and that generative AI technologies pose "a threat to the primacy of traditional internet search."

Neil Chilson, head of AI policy at the Abundance Institute and former chief technologist for the Federal Trade Commission, expressed uncertainty about how helpful these AI-specific remedies will be for the competitors. Gabriel Weinberg, the founder and CEO of DuckDuckGo, believes the remedies ordered by the judge don't go far enough to prevent Google from holding back competitors.

Christian Kroll, the founder and CEO of Berlin-based Ecosia, advocates for Google's profits from Chrome to be used for climate action. The DOJ did not argue for a remedy that would force Google to share its advertising data, and Google will not have to do so as part of the remedies ordered by the judge.

The Google case is far from over, as the tech giant has long maintained it would file an appeal for both the remedies and Judge Mehta's previous finding that the tech company violated federal antitrust laws with its search engine dominance. Mehta called for the establishment of a technological oversight committee to monitor Google's compliance with the ordered measures for six years.

Judge approves partial continued use of Google Chrome while imposing additional penalties in antitrust case