The Justice Department plans to file antitrust charges against Google as early as this summer, two people with knowledge of the situation said, in what would be one of the United States' biggest antitrust actions since the late 1990's.
The Department of Justice is still investigating the internet business and has made progress on its case, the people said, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the specifics were confidential. The regulators concentrate on Google's dominance in the online advertising industry and the lawsuit would also contain claims that the company exploited its dominant position in online search to hurt rivals, the people said. State attorneys general are likely to file their own antitrust complaint against Google, or enter the case at the Justice Department later this year, a individual with state investigation information said.
Taken together, these lawsuits against Google, which dominates about 90 percent of all global web searches, will be one of the biggest antitrust cases in the U.S. since the 1990s when the Department of Justice joined 20 states to prosecute Microsoft. In 2001 the two sides arrived at resolution. The moves will also set a precedent for how regulators and policymakers perform inquiries into other major tech companies such as Facebook and Amazon, which are being scrutinized by the Federal Trade Commission, state attorneys general and Congress for their market dominance and corporate behaviour. Google , Facebook, Amazon, Apple and others have evolved for nearly two decades, with little oversight from American authorities, to become gateways to internet search, advertisement, electronic messaging, digital entertainment, and e-commerce.
Europe has for years been ahead of the United States in taking regulatory action against Google and other tech behemoths. In recent years , European authorities have fined Google for, among other items, discriminatory advertisement laws and its misuse of dominance in the cell phone industry.
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