Google has currently taken “several brazen high-profile actions” to expand the monopoly of its search engine – thumbing its nose at regulators even after its landmark antitrust trial with the Justice Department began last fall, watchdog groups warned in a Tuesday letter to the feds.
The letter, which was sent to FTC chief Lina Khan and the DOJ’s top antitrust lawyer Jonathan Kanter and obtained exclusively by The Post, asserted that Google continues to be moving “full steam ahead” with anticompetitive practices despite the regulatory crackdown to date and the DOJ’s effort to expose its shady tactics throughout the “historic” search trial.
Several distinguished anti-monopoly organizations – including Demand Progress, the Revolving Door Project, Fight for the Future and the Tech Oversight Project — were among the many 15 groups that urged a coordinated crackdown on the company giant.
“Google’s ongoing efforts to entrench its monopoly position in search — and exclude or buy off potential rivals — display that even the DOJ’s lawsuit and heightened regulatory scrutiny abroad haven’t deterred the corporate,” the letter said.
The letter points to three separate recent developments, including a reported partnership to embed Google search results inside TikTok.
The tie-up surfaced last September within the midst of the DOJ’s antitrust trial, where lawyers were laying out their argument that Google has relied on such deals to stifle potential competition.
“This extraordinary maneuver betrays Google’s sense of its own impunity, even as the corporate is being scrutinized for exclusionary deals to make it the default search engine on quite a lot of devices and in quite a lot of browsers,” the letter said.
The letter also noted recent reports that Google has begun testing a man-made intelligence tool called “Search Generative Experience” and discussed integrating advanced AI tools into its search engine.
An AI-integrated Google search would “allow Google to use AI to scrape information from across the web and present comprehensive results to users…while systematically diverting traffic (and the economic profit derived from traffic) away from the source web sites that Google has scraped,” the letter said.
The warning echoed complaints by news outlets who’ve slammed Google and Microsoft-backed OpenAI from using copyrighted material to train the “large language models” that power their AI chatbots without proper credit or compensation.
Lastly, the antitrust groups reference an open letter last November to the European Commission from 30 corporations which allege that Google has engaged in anti-competitive self-preferencing by boosting its own “comparison shopping service” over rivals in search results.
The businesses warned they “will probably be worn out” unless European regulators take motion.
“Amid historic and deeply credible monopoly cases against Google, one might be forgiven for considering that it would cause Sundar Pichai and Google leadership to rethink its likely illegal business practices,” Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project, said in a press release. “That simply hasn’t been the case.”
“From buying up latest search markets to constructing moats around its AI products, Google is continuous to exclude competitors, limit alternative for consumers, and manipulate our entire economy,” Haworth added. “Google needs to be held accountable in order that they play by the identical rules as everyone else.”
Andrea Beaty, research director on the Revolving Door Project, said Google has been “tirelessly in search of to entrench any anti-competitive advantage that slips under the radar of regulators.”
“The DOJ and FTC must pursue constant, robust, and comprehensive enforcement so as to rein within the Big Tech monopolies, as their entrenched power can’t be reversed with stand-alone enforcement actions,” Beaty added.
Top Congressional leaders from each parties are also copied on the letter, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY).
The groups called on Congress to “strengthen existing laws to protect consumers, businesses, and marginalized communities from Google’s abuses.”
“We urge you to proceed to use the complete power of your offices to bring Google into compliance with the law, including through forward-looking remedies that address the corporate’s scale, the cumulative effects of its harm, and the necessity for brand new technological disruptions to emerge,” the groups said.
The DOJ and FTC declined to comment.
A Google spokesperson pushed back on the letter’s assertions.
“As we’ve said all along, people have more ways than ever to access information, they usually select to use Google since it’s helpful,” a spokesperson said in a press release.
Google identified that the corporate has been testing AI features in search for years. The corporate asserted that a recent boom in AI technologies shows it faces intense competition within the sector.
The corporate also noted it’s currently appealing a $2.6 billion advantageous imposed by European regulators over its shopping business. Google has denied wrongdoing in that case.
Google is currently awaiting US District Judge Amit Mehta’s decision on whether it maintains an illegal monopoly over online search, which is predicted in May.
Mehta – who has faced sharp criticism for allowing the high-profile trial to play out with unprecedented secrecy – said in November that he had “no idea” how he would rule.
DOJ lawyers argued Google uses huge payments to partners like Apple and AT&T — including $26.3 billion in 2021 alone – to ensure its search engine is enabled by default on most products and maintain a 90% market share.
The search giant is facing a wave of other lawsuits targeting features of its sprawling business empire, including a highly anticipated US antitrust trial over its digital promoting business slated to begin in September.
In December, Google was handed a shocking defeat after a jury found its “Play” store for Android apps was a monopoly.
A federal judge will determine what business practices Google must change consequently of the decision.