Georgia Plus DoJ and Ten Other States File Suit Against Google for Potential Anti-Trust Violations

Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr announced Georgia, the Department of Justice, and ten other state Attorneys General filed a lawsuit in US District Court alleging Google of violating anti-trust statutes. The press release is posted below.

Attorney General Chris Carr – along with the Department of Justice and ten other state Attorneys General — today filed a civil antitrust lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to prevent Google from unlawfully maintaining monopolies through anticompetitive and exclusionary practices in the search and search advertising markets. The participating state Attorneys General offices represent Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, South Carolina, and Texas.

“On behalf of Georgians, our office joined this lawsuit to address Google’s potential anticompetitive conduct in order to maintain a fair and free market for consumers, advertisers and all companies now reliant on the internet economy,” said Attorney General Chris Carr.

As alleged in the Complaint, Google has entered into a series of exclusionary agreements to lock up the primary avenues through which users access search engines, and thus the internet, by requiring that Google be set as the default or exclusive search engine on billions of mobile devices and computers worldwide. In particular, the Complaint alleges that Google has unlawfully maintained monopolies in search and search advertising by:

• Entering into exclusivity agreements that forbid preinstallation of any competing search service.
• Entering into tying and other arrangements that force preinstallation of its search applications in prime locations on mobile devices and make them undeletable, regardless of consumer preference. 
• Entering into long-term agreements with Apple that require Google to be the default – and de facto exclusive – general search engine on Apple’s popular Safari browser and other Apple search tools.
• Generally using monopoly profits to buy preferential treatment for its search engine on devices, web browsers, and other search access points, creating a continuous and self-reinforcing cycle of monopolization.

These and other anticompetitive practices can harm competition and consumers, reducing the ability of innovative new companies to develop, compete, and discipline Google’s behavior. 

The antitrust laws protect our free market economy and forbid monopolists from engaging in anticompetitive practices. They also empower the Georgia Attorney General as parens patriae on behalf of Georgia citizens to bring cases like this one to remedy violations and restore competition. Decades ago DOJ’s and a state AG coalition’s case against Microsoft recognized that the antitrust laws forbid anticompetitive agreements by high-technology monopolists to require preinstalled default status, to shut off distribution channels to rivals, and to make software undeletable. The Complaint alleges that Google is using similar agreements itself to maintain and extend its own dominance.     

The Complaint alleges that Google’s anticompetitive practices have had harmful effects on competition and consumers. Google has foreclosed any meaningful search competitor from gaining vital distribution and scale, eliminating competition for a majority of search queries in the United States. By restricting competition in search, Google’s conduct has harmed consumers by reducing the quality of search (including on dimensions such as privacy, data protection, and use of consumer data), lessening choice in search, and impeding innovation. By suppressing competition in advertising, Google has the power to charge advertisers more than it could in a competitive market and to reduce the quality of the services it provides them.

Google is a limited liability company organized and existing under the laws of the State of Delaware, and is headquartered in Mountain View, California. Google is owned by Alphabet Inc., a publicly traded company incorporated and existing under the laws of the State of Delaware and headquartered in Mountain View, California.