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Google was hit with a second multistate antitrust lawsuit in two days Thursday, with the most recent claiming the company altered the designs of its search engine to undercut competitors.
In the complaint, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, a Democrat, and Nebraska AG Doug Peterson, a Republican — joined by 36 other AGs of states and U.S. territories — allege Alphabet Inc.’s GOOGL, -1.00% GOOG, -0.93% search engine engaged in unlawfully manipulating search results in a clear “concentration of power,” Weiser said. It seeks to consolidate with a Justice Department suit filed in October.
“Google often says people use Google, but I would argue Google uses people,” Peterson said in a Zoom conference call. The states allege Google’s “acquisition and command of vast amounts of data obtained because of consumers’ lack of choice has fortified Google’s monopolies.”
Added New York AG Letitia James, who joined the suit: “Google sits at the crossroads of so many areas of our digital economy and has used its dominance to illegally squash competitors, monitor nearly every aspect of our digital lives, and profit to the tune of billions. Through its illegal conduct, the company has ensured that hundreds of millions of people turn to Google first when looking for an answer, but it doesn’t take a web search to understand that unchecked corporate power shouldn’t have disproportionate control over our data and information. For decades now, Google has served as the gatekeeper of the internet and has weaponized our data to kill off competitors and control our decision making — resulting in all of us paying more for the services we use every day.”
Though the AGs recommend divestiture, Weiser said it would be “premature to discuss” remedies.
The lawsuit focuses on how Google displays search results, amid complaints from rivals like Yelp Inc. YELP, -2.26% and Expedia Group Inc. EXPE, -1.67% about how Google favors its own competing services in search results. This has forced Yelp, Expedia and others to pay to advertise at the top of search results or sacrifice traffic.
“The bipartisan enforcement action of the state attorneys general today is arguably more significant than previous lawsuits in that it strikes at the foundation of Google’s dominance: its search results,” Luther Lowe, senior vice president of public policy at Yelp, said in a statement. “For nearly a decade, Yelp’s small public policy team has openly advocated for heightened antitrust scrutiny of Google’s behavior, so it is gratifying to see Google finally brought to justice for this specific conduct.”
For more: Big Tech has an antitrust target on its back, and it is growing
Google was not immediately available for comment. Shares of the company’s stock were flat in early-afternoon trading Thursday.
The Colorado-Nebraska suit comes on the heels of a Texas-led suit of 10 red state AGs Wednesday that accuses Google’s dominant search engine of wielding a monopoly of the online-advertisement market through its influence on every aspect of the market: buyers, sellers and the exchange on which many interact.
Read more: Google hit with second U.S. antitrust suit, and a third is expected soon
A Google spokeswoman said the company “will strongly defend ourselves from his baseless claims in court.”
In October, the Justice Department and a dozen states sued Alphabet for monopolistic and anticompetitive actions, particularly its use of a search deal with Apple Inc. AAPL, +0.42% and the mandatory inclusion of Google apps in its Android mobile operating system.
Kent Walker, Google’s senior vice president for legal affairs, called the suit “deeply flawed” and said it won’t help consumers.
Read more: Google officially charged with antitrust by Justice Department
The three-headed lawsuit against Google differs in approach from a single New York-led suit of Facebook Inc. FB, +0.08% last week that includes AGs from 46 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. It objects to the social-networking giant’s dominance, especially through its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. The suit, coupled with a Federal Trade Commission action, seek Facebook to peel off Instagram and WhatsApp.
Read more: Facebook hit with antitrust suits that seek to ‘unwind’ Instagram, WhatsApp acquisitions
The composition of the broader Facebook action — which parallels the narrative of DOJ charges filed against Microsoft Corp. MSFT, -0.08% for monopolistic business practices three decades ago — is likely to result in prolonged legal actions that could take years, according to legal experts.
