Google’s move to create a monopoly for its search engine, exploiting its dominance to squash competition and stifle innovation, has been ruled as illegal by a United States Judge.
The ruling issued by U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta on Monday is a major blow to Alphabet, Google’s parent company, and it can cause the technology giants in their business.
“ After having carefully considered and weighed the witness testimony and evidence, the court reached the following conclusion: Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Judge Amit Mehta said.
“Google enjoys an 89.2% share of the market for general search services, which increases to 94.9% on mobile devices. Google’s dominance in the search market is evidence of its monopoly.” The Judge said in his 277-page ruling.
Google pays more than $10bn (£7.8bn) a year to maintain a monopoly in the search markets.
The ruling comes after the US Department of Justice in 2020 sued Google over 90% control in search markets as the US authorities attempt to compete in the search markets.
The ruling doesn’t include penalties for Google and Alphabet but Google’s president of global affairs, Kent Walker said the company will appeal the US Judge ruling.
“This decision recognizes that Google offers the best search engine, but concludes that we shouldn’t be allowed to make it easily available. Given this, and that people are increasingly looking for information in more and more ways, we plan to appeal. Walker said.
US Attorney General Merrick Garland has described the ruling as a historic win for the American people.
According to him, no company or person is above the law irrespective of how influential or large you are.
Google’s search engine processes an estimated 8.5 billion queries every day worldwide, nearly double its daily volume from 12 years ago, according to a recent study by investment firm BOND.
Source: Elvisanokyenews.com
