US ends antitrust lawsuit against Google over digital advertising | Economie

The US Department of Justice is ending a lawsuit against Google, the search engine of Alphabet Group, for abusing its dominant position in the digital advertising market, according to financial news agency Bloomberg, which cited a familiar source. case in which they asked not to be identified. The Ministry of Justice expected the antitrust lawsuit to be brought before the court before the end of this week, and perhaps until Tuesday, according to these sources.

The Department of Justice already sued Google in October 2020 over its dominant position in the search market and related advertising. At the time, still under the presidency of Donald Trump, Attorney General William Barr noted That Google has over the years captured “nearly 90% of all search queries in the US and has used anti-competitive tactics to maintain and expand its monopolies in search and search advertising”. “Google has entered into a series of opt-out agreements that collectively block the main ways users can access search engines, and by extension the Internet, by requiring Google to be the default public search engine on billions of mobile devices and computers around the world,” he added. In one of the cases, the pre-installation of a competitor is prohibited, and this case is expected to go to trial next September.

This new lawsuit will center on the US digital advertising market, worth $278.6 billion. Google controls most of the technology used to buy, sell, and serve ads across the Internet. Attorney generals from various states have filed other lawsuits against Google’s practices, alleging that it abuses its dominance in the search, ad technology, and app markets on the Android mobile platform, in violation of antitrust laws.

Mountain View, California, ranks first in the global digital advertising market, which is worth $626.86 billion, according to a 2023 estimate by research firm EMarketer, citing Bloomberg. Alphabet’s advertising operations are expected to generate $73.8 billion in digital ad revenue in the United States by 2023. Google operates an ad buying service for sellers and an ad selling service for publishers, as well as an exchange in which both parties transact in ultra-quick auctions.

Google has argued that the online advertising market is saturated and competitive. In its filings before the courts and Congress, the company has indicated that its competitors include other large players in the ad technology market, such as Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft.

Although the actions against Google’s abuse of dominant position come from the days of the former president, the Biden administration has been very hard on tech giants and companies from other sectors. Various regulators challenged, among other processes, Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Based on Simon & Schuster by Penguin Random House, That it was already rejected by the courts, in an already firm decision. Penguin Random House announced that it would appeal, but Simon & Schuster preferred to opt out of the process.