Google Must Make Tech More Compatible With Rivals, Judge Rules

Google must improve the ability of its advertising technology to integrate with the products of competitors, according to the decision of a federal judge made public Wednesday. The opinion follows a ruling last year that Google operated an illegal monopoly in parts of the market for advertising technology, in part because Google illegally tied different products together. Judge Leonie Brinkema, of the U.S. District Court for the eastern district of Virginia, gave a broad outline of her decision earlier this month.

Brinkema said the rise of new technologies, including artificial intelligence, prevented a more stringent remedy. She said that AI could “threaten the stability and growth” of web advertising. The threat of AI helped push Brinkema to side with Google that the company should only be subjected to the antitrust remedies for six years, not 15 as the Department of Justice had argued, because that would be too long for the court to intervene in a rapidly changing market. She cited a judge’s opinion in the anti-trust case against Microsoft that “imposing a remedy is not unlike trying to shoe a galloping horse.’”

AI’s effect on the search market also helped Google avoid a breakup in a separate anti-trust case last year.

Brinkema explained her decision to not force Google to divest its advertising technology business, against the government’s wishes. She argued that the government did not establish that a divestiture would rectify competition any more than behavioral remedies, except due to industry distrust of Google. She said distrust alone “cannot justify divestiture.”