Google Could Be Facing a New Antitrust Investigation in the U.S.
- Mehedi Hassan
- Jun 01, 2019
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18
Google could soon find itself in another antitrust probe. The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday evening that the Department of Justice in the United States is preparing an antitrust investigation against the search engine giant.
Following WSJ’s report, The New York Times reported that a new antitrust task force at the FTC has referred complaints about Google to the DOJ, leading to the Justice Department preparing a new antitrust investigation against the company.
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The latest antitrust probe against Google focuses on the company’s advertising and search business, which is how it makes most of its money.
This wouldn’t be the first time Google has faced an antitrust investigation from the U.S. government. Back in 2013, the company reached a settlement with the FTC the commission raised concerns about Google’s abuse of power in the market. This would, however, be the first antitrust case against a big tech company during the Trump admission. With the recent calls to break up big tech companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft, this new antitrust case against Google could be crucial for some in the 2020 presidential run.
The United States isn’t the only place Google is being investigated, however. Google is being investigated in Ireland over suspected infringement of the GDPR privacy laws, and it was only hit with a $5 billion antitrust fine over Android back in 2018.
Conversation 18 comments
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Bats
<p>This is perfectly fine with me. I am a big fan of Google, however, they have gotten to big, powerful, and arrogant. Not just that, but they are run by a bunch of socialist dreamers, who believe they are doing good. I believe, that they believe that. That's a problem. Because Google controls Search, they control how information is given and that's a huge problem. Because other search engines have failed miserably (both in function and marketing), like Bing, Yahoo, etc…. to compete with Google, and thus we are in this predicament. </p><p><br></p><p>To be honest, I don't care about the advertising unless we are talking politics. However, for the search….that's another issue. For me, I have no problem with it, because I know the fake news from the real news. It's why I am always on the right side of everything. However, for those others who don't know any better….that's a problem. It's just too bad the free market doesn't know how to keep them in check.</p><p><br></p><p>Like I said, for the advertising…I don't care because of the privacy options made available. Plus great things don't come free, and their products and services are great. Someone has to pay for it and I don't mind paying Google with my personal info. </p><p><br></p><p>However, like I said, the search sector in their business is the dangerous one. This is why I am advocate for regulating the internet. It's becoming too much of a problem that these companies are just too big , to the point where their platforms have become the standard. After all, I get upset when I read about Twitter bans or when fake news is part of Google Search results. The biggest jokes I read was when Facebook said that they were combatting fake news on their platform with Snopes. LOL….that was a joke. Also when, Google said that they were going to work with the New York Times and other sources for news gathering….that was a joke too. That's because news outlets such as NYT, CNN, etc…. are all famously biased and always wrong. </p><p><br></p><p>I hope this goes anti-trust probe happens. I think at the end it's going to end in a settlement, but hopefully Google and their (dumb) low level employees will get the message and we can see some regulation on the internet on the US side of the world.</p>
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skane2600
<p>There are legitimate reasons for the government to look at Google from an antitrust POV, but with this Administration, one wonders if the motivation is because of their imaginary belief that tech companies are censoring legitimate conservative voices (note that I said <em>legitimate </em>I'm not talking about Alex Jones et al.).</p>
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dontbe evil
<p>finally</p>