In the midst of the largest U.S. antitrust trial in a quarter-century, regulators may reshape the digital landscape, potentially challenging the dominance of a search engine that governs the online world for billions of users.
With the 10-week trial investigating Google’s business practices reaching its midpoint, the outcome remains uncertain. U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta is yet to decide whether the Justice Department’s accusations of Google operating an illegal search engine monopoly hold weight. If found guilty, it could herald a significant transformation in the online realm, offering consumers and businesses fresh avenues to explore information, entertainment, and commerce.
One potential outcome is that Judge Mehta compels Google to open doors for startups and third-party competitors, increasing competition and enhancing the quality of online services, according to Luther Lowe, Senior Vice President of Public Policy at Yelp, a long-standing critic of Google’s self-favoring search results.
Google’s current stranglehold on the search market stems from its ability to deliver near-instant, relevant information from billions of indexed websites, an achievement dating back to the late 1990s. Additionally, Google invests billions yearly to secure its search engine’s position as the default choice for users of the world’s most popular smartphones and web browsers.
While users can change their default search engines, this process is often too cumbersome to be practical, explaining Google’s willingness to invest heavily in these privileged positions. The Justice Department highlights these payments, particularly the $15 billion to $20 billion annually to Apple, as a key issue, which Judge Mehta may prohibit if Google is found guilty.
In the U.S., a likely remedy would require smartphones and web browsers to offer a choice of search engines during setup, akin to the European approach. However, most users in Europe still opt for Google, either because they genuinely consider it the best search engine or trust it more than alternatives like Microsoft’s Bing or privacy-focused DuckDuckGo.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella argues that Google holds an almost hypnotic sway over users, asserting that the only way to break this habit is by changing the default choice. If a ruling does not exclude Google’s rivals from paying for default search engine status, Microsoft could exploit the opportunity to make Bing the default choice.
Amid these possibilities, Florian Schaub, an associate professor of information at the University of Michigan, suggests that a fair outcome would be to ban all default agreements between companies to inject neutrality and provide consumers with genuine choices.
During the trial, Apple executive Eddy Cue explained that Google is the preferred search engine on their devices because it offers the best customer experience. A scenario where Apple is blocked from using Google could lead the tech giant to develop its own search technology.
A blanket ban on default search agreements could bring unintended consequences, such as price increases for other popular products, warns David Olson, an associate professor at the Boston College Law School. It’s unclear whether Google’s dominant position in search will change if users actively choose it, but the company would have more funds to allocate to other ventures once devoted to such deals.
The trial’s focus on Google’s search engine may have broader implications for the technology industry if Judge Mehta decides that all default settings are anti-competitive, potentially banning all defaults in device settings.
This decision could dismantle the digital walls surrounding the iPhone, potentially allowing other virtual assistants like Siri to compete, and opening the door to a new legal battleground.