DOJ's multi-year war on Google

The Justice Department launched two massive antitrust lawsuits targeting Google's search dominance and ad-tech empire, seeking to dismantle its digital monopoly.

“The Justice Department has spent years attempting to break up Google’s gargantuan advertising business across two separate antitrust lawsuits”

Courts label Google an illegal monopoly

Judges repeatedly sided with the government, finding Google guilty of illegally exercising monopoly power over both online search advertising and ad technology.

“In 2024, a court determined that Google’s search business, including its exceedingly lucrative search-ad operation, was an illegal monopoly”

Search breakup proposal gets rejected

Prosecutors pushed to strip Google of Chrome and Android, but Judge Amit Mehta rejected divestiture, ordering milder data-sharing remedies instead.

Ad-tech business avoids forced spin-off

Judge Leonie Brinkema ruled Google can keep its ad business, requiring operational tweaks to help competitors rather than forcing a corporate breakup.

“Instead of selling it, the search giant will instead be required to adjust its business practices to favor competitors”

Specific remedies stay under seal

While Google celebrated avoiding a split, the precise operational changes ordered by the court remain sealed for two weeks for redactions.

“We’re very pleased the Court rejected the DOJ’s proposal to break apart tools that help small businesses reach new customers and grow.”

Monopoly built on exclusive default deals

Google cemented its dominance by paying device manufacturers and mobile carriers massive revenue cuts to secure default search engine status worldwide.

“Google used exclusive agreements with device manufacturers, which made it the default search engine across huge swaths of the mobile phone market”