Google has been back in federal court to fend off the United States Department of Justice’s attempt to topple its internet empire at the same time it is navigating a pivotal shift to artificial intelligence (AI) that could undercut its power.
On Friday, the legal and technological threats facing Google were among the key issues being dissected during the closing arguments of a legal proceeding that will determine the changes imposed upon the company in the wake of its dominant search engine being declared an illegal monopoly by US District Judge Amit Mehta last year.
Brandishing evidence presented during a recent three-week stretch of hearings, Justice Department lawyers are attempting to persuade Mehta to order a radical shake-up that includes a ban on Google paying to lock its search engine in as the default on smart devices and an order requiring the company to sell its Chrome browser.
Google lawyers say only minor concessions are needed, especially as the upheaval triggered by advances in artificial intelligence already are reshaping the search landscape, as alternative, conversational search options are rolling out from AI startups that are hoping to use the Department of Justice’s four-and-half-year-old case to gain the upper hand in the next technological frontier.
Mehta used Friday’s hearing to ask probing and pointed questions to lawyers for both sides while hinting that he was seeking a middle ground between the two camps’ proposed remedies.
“We’re not looking to kneecap Google,” the judge said, adding that the goal was to “kickstart” competitors’ ability to challenge the search giant’s dominance.
After the daylong closing arguments, Mehta will spend much of the next several months mulling a decision that he plans to issue before Labor Day in the US (September 1). Google has already promised to appeal the ruling that branded its search engine as a monopoly, a step it cannot take until the judge orders a remedy.
AI an inflection point
While both sides of this showdown agree that AI is an inflection point for the industry’s future, they have disparate views on how the shift will affect Google.
The Justice Department contends that AI technology by itself will not rein in Google’s power, arguing additional legal restraints must be slapped on a search engine that’s the main reason its parent company, Alphabet Inc, is valued at $2 trillion.
Mehta indicated in court Friday that he was still undecided on how much AI’s potential to shake up the search market should be incorporated in his forthcoming ruling. “This is what I’ve been struggling with,” Mehta said early in the hearing.
Justice prosecutor David Dahlquist urged the judge to issue forward-thinking remedies that would “pry open” the search market to competition and not allow Google to use its search monopoly to unfairly benefit itself in the AI race.
Google has already been deploying AI to transform its search engine into an answer engine, an effort that has so far helped maintain its perch as the internet’s main gateway despite inroads being made by alternatives from the likes of OpenAI and Perplexity.
The Justice Department contends a divestiture of the Chrome browser that Google CEO Sundar Pichai helped build nearly 20 years ago would be among the most effective countermeasures against Google continuing to amass massive volumes of browser traffic and personal data that could be leveraged to retain its dominance in the AI era.
Executives from both OpenAI and Perplexity testified last month that they would be eager bidders for the Chrome browser if Mehta orders its sale.
Google’s lawyer John Schmidtlein said on Friday that AI companies should “get to work” on their own products rather than try to persuade the court to give them unfair access to Google’s innovations.
The debate over Google’s fate also has pulled in opinions from Apple, mobile app developers, legal scholars and startups.
Apple, which collects more than $20bn annually to make Google the default search engine on the iPhone and its other devices, filed briefs arguing against the Justice Department’s proposed 10-year ban on such lucrative lock-in agreements.
Apple told the judge that prohibiting the contracts would deprive the company of money that it funnels into its own research, and that the ban might make Google even more powerful because the company would be able to hold onto its money while consumers would end up choosing its search engine anyway. The Cupertino, California, company also told the judge a ban would not compel it to build its own search engine to compete against Google.
In other filings, a group of legal scholars said the Justice Department’s proposed divestiture of Chrome would be an improper penalty that would inject unwarranted government interference in a company’s business.
Meanwhile, former Federal Trade Commission officials James Cooper and Andrew Stivers warned that another proposal, which would require Google to share its data with rival search engines, “does not account for the expectations users have developed over time regarding the privacy, security, and stewardship” of their personal information.
The App Association, a group that represents mostly small software developers, also advised Mehta not to adopt the Justice Department’s proposed changes because of the ripple effects they would have across the tech industry.
Hobbling Google in the way the Justice Department envisions would make it more difficult for startups to realise their goal of being acquired, the App Association wrote. “Developers will be overcome by uncertainty” if Google is torn apart, the group argues.
