Google's advertising business, a key piece of revenue for the tech giant, is an illegal monopoly, US District Judge Leonie Brinkema ruled on Thursday.
In the memorandum opinion, the court writes that Google has violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act, a landmark antitrust law from 1890. The ruling says Google broke the law "by willfully acquiring and maintaining monopoly power in the open-web display publisher ad server market and the open-web display ad exchange market."
When asked for comment, Lee-Anne Mulholland, Google's vice president of regulatory affairs told CNET via email, "We won half of this case and we will appeal the other half...We disagree with the Court's decision regarding our publisher tools. Publishers have many options and they choose Google because our ad tech tools are simple, affordable and effective."
The case was brought by US federal government and a coalition of 17 states. The next step is for the court to set a hearing date to begin discussions over "appropriate remedies," but it's unclear how soon that date might be. Google's appeal could draw things out over the course of months or years.
Google's large ecosystem of businesses has been under a microscope in recent years. In August 2024, a US federal court ruled that Google's search engine was also an illegal monopoly. Meta is also in court this week for similar antitrust claims around its acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp brought by the Federal Trade Commission.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
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