After the U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against search engine operator Google last year in cooperation with eleven U.S. states, Google is now expected to hand over extensive data as part of the competition lawsuit.
Government demands too broad
The U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against Google last October because the government sees possible violations of competition law by the company. The previous eleven U.S. states involved have now been joined by others, including Google’s home state of California. As part of the lawsuit, the investigating judges are seeking the search results and associated advertisements that were played out in the period from February 2 to 8, 2015 and from February 03 to 09, 2020. In particular, the judges want to see the users’ search queries, the advertisements displayed, and the composition of ad prices for advertisers.
Violation of the Sherman Act
With the U.S. government’s input, they want about 80 different pieces of data from Google about each search query. In particular, the U.S. government wants to know more about Google’s market shares in other areas. Also possible cooperations with Apple with regard to the two mobile operating systems iOS and Android are to be disclosed. For example, the integration of the Google search engine on the iPhone. This could be a violation of the Sherman Act, which is the basis of competition law in America. Google vehemently opposes the demands of the US government because the information is too broad and therefore not legal.
