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Google CEO Sundar Pichai take the stand Monday in theU.S. government ’s antitrust trialagainst the troupe . The executive defended Google ’s concern manoeuvre , including its pile with Apple and other cooperator to make Google the default hunt locomotive engine .
The causa stems from a2020 antitrust claimover Google ’s dominance in the online search market . The claim is separate fromone filed in Januaryby the Department of Justice , along with eight United States Department of State include New York , California and Colorado , that aim to “ stanch Google ’s anticompetitive scheme , unwind Google ’s monopolistic grip on the market and restore competition to digital advertizement . ”
The government has argued that Google uses its platforms and deals with partner to block out any competition in hunting or ad , thus hindering competitors from get at the data they ’d need to ameliorate their products .
Google argues that it ’s just doing concern . Everybody wants Google as the default locomotive engine because it ’s the best . That does n’t make its actions illegal , the companionship says .
Monday ’s run hearing revealed plenty of risque tidbits , including the $ 26.3 billion Google spent making itself the nonremittal search engine across platforms in 2021 , how Google tried to take it further and have Chrome preinstalled on iPhones and more .
Google paid $26 billion in 2021 to be everyone’s default search engine
When Google ’s hunting head Prabhakar Raghavan testified in court on October 28 , he revealed that the technical school giant had paid $ 26.3 billion in 2021 to multiple web browser , phones and program , from company include Apple , Samsung and Mozilla , The Vergereports .
About $ 18 billion of that total amount operate directly to Apple , according to aNew York Timesreport put out before this calendar month . Google has had its deal with Apple in lieu since 2003 .
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When questioned on the amount of money Google pass to get first selection of search engines , Pichai said that the decision was made with the consumer in judgment . Google pays big Pearl Buck to be everywhere so that it can take in all the data and be the best search locomotive engine across different companies ’ devices , said Pichai , concord toThe Verge .
Google understood the value of defaults very early on . U.S. Justice Department attorney Meagan Bellshaw shew Pichai a 2007 email from a Google product strategy meeting containing data showing that when people convert their web internet browser homepage to Google , they did 15 % more Google searches . When they tack aside , their Google searches drop 27 % .
“ Nitin argues that focalise on home page market share is one of the most effectual thing we can do to make gains in search marketplace share,”read an email that resume the meeting and was place to Pichai , as well as other Google leader , harmonize to The Verge .
The amount that Google spent on home page market portion has been a fixing point in the run . in the beginning this month , the CEOs of Microsoft and DuckDuckGo show that their search engines would have been far more successful , even competitive with Google , had they been able to make similar deals with Apple . Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella even say he was willing to expend $ 15 billion per year to get Bing into Apple ’s default search , perThe Information .
Google agreed not to promote Chrome to Safari users
As part of its lookup deal with Apple , Google agreed not to promote Chrome to Safari users , reports Bloomberg . Google would have been able to do this with banners , soda - ups and other annoying means in other Google apps .
The arrangement also think of that Apple never switched to a Google competitor or allowed users to choose their web web browser when set up their iPhones .
Google tried to be preinstalled on iPhones
Pichai admit to attempting to get Tim Cook to preinstall Google on every iOS machine back in 2018,according toThe Verge . He hoped to make Google and Apple ’s services so connect as to be inseparable .
The way Pichai pitched it would have been a win - winnings for both companies . Google gets more people look on its political program — not to remark all that gamy data — and Apple would get more revenue , as a result of the lucrative search agreement the two sign .
For whatever reason , Cook did n’t take the sweetener . Apple does n’t preload third - party computer software onto its devices , and it was n’t run to make an exception for Google .
Google’s deleted chat logs
During Pichai ’s testimonial , the DOJ touched on Google ’s policy of delete internal Old World chat messages , despite being dependent to a judicial proceeding grip . In February , the DOJ accused Google of systematically destroying chat through its account - off option , which deletes messages every 24 60 minutes unless a exploiter manually switch the setting .
Pichai said that he take action against the chronicle - off nonpayment for confabulation in February to follow with the DOJ ’s litigation hold , according toCNBC .
Bellshaw attract up a substance interchange in 2021 where Pichai ask for history to be plow off in a group Old World chat . Pichai responded that he wanted to discuss a personnel department thing and the matter had nothing to do with the judicial proceeding grip , which he said he take great care to comply with .
A moment of nostalgia for Internet Explorer
Cast your memories back to 2005 , when Microsoft ’s Internet Explorer became the default hunt locomotive engine . Back then , Google ’s legal chief David Drummond sent Microsoft an angry letter , saying that making Internet Explorer the search default was anticompetitive . Oh , how the mesa have turned .
After institute that Google understand the inherent value of nonpayment , Bellshaw brought up Drummond ’s letter to set up the hypocrisy of Google today . The letter declared that problem with a default context are made bad by how change to defaults are handled , and that most end exploiter “ do not change defaults . ”
These are exactly the argument that other hunting engine party , like DuckDuckGo , Brave or Microsoft ’s Bing , make when they accuse Google of being anticompetitive by making batch with Apple and others . The DOJ double down on this , enounce Google has become the monopoly it denounced years ago .
What does it all mean?
The font is expect to continue for several calendar week , bringing to a drumhead one of the biggest fights in tech antitrust since the U.S. take away Microsoft to trial in the 1990s .
If the judge rein against Google , the outcome could look a lot like the Microsoft deal , in which the computer company was required to change its behavior and apportion its APIs with third - party developer . Microsoft was also banish from prepare anticompetitive and undivided deals with computer manufacturer .
Google might end up sustain to turn over all or most of the data it has collected to other search engines so they can improve their mathematical product and appeal more users . The DOJ has said that Google gets 16 times more information than Bing does everyday .
The Google outcome could also have a ripple effect on other Big Tech example . The FTC sued Amazon in September for using anticompetitive and unfair strategies toillegally maintain its monopoly big businessman . TheDOJ has been investigating Applefor year over the company ’s policy for third - party apps on its devices and whether it below the belt favors its own products . There ’s an ongoing fount between theFTC and Facebook , wherein the agency call on Facebook to sell Instagram and WhatsApp .
Enforcers will want to show that antitrust legal philosophy is still relevant and can successfully take on the biggest , most powerful society in the world .
