OPINION:
The final phase of the U.S. v. Google “search” trial just wrapped up, and we will soon learn just how far Judge Amit Mehta is willing to go to stick it to Big Tech.
Here’s a quick refresher on the situation. During fall, Judge Mehta largely sided with the Justice Department’s contention that Google monopolizes the online search market. At the same time, he made clear that Google had primarily succeeded by consistently innovating and developing “the industry’s highest quality search engine.” The problem, he said, was Google’s contracts with various mobile phone manufacturers, which made its search engine and related tools the default option on their devices.
The remedy for that problem is obvious: Stop Google from entering into the same kinds of contracts. Late last year, however, the Justice Department offered the court a wish list of aggressive “remedies” that had little to do with righting contractual wrongs and everything to do with breaking up Google. The Justice Department asked that Google be forced to sell its popular Chrome browser and possibly its Android operating system; give rivals its search algorithms, search results and related data; curtail its artificial intelligence investments; and change many of its integrated search tools such as maps and reviews so they are no easier to use than those offered by competitors. The state attorneys general who joined the lawsuit even asked that Google bankroll a “nationwide advertising and education program” to encourage Americans to use competitors’ inferior search engines.
Those requests would be laughable if they didn’t have such profound implications for developers, innovation and consumers. Consider the forced divestiture of Chrome. The world’s most popular web browser, Chrome, offers developers free tools for upgrading, monitoring and debugging websites and apps across browsers. Google pours enormous technical and financial resources into Chrome’s functionality and security. Without those resources, billions of users would likely experience far less seamless and secure web browsing, and businesses across industries would struggle to deliver reliable, secure web experiences. That would mean far more time and money spent on maintenance and troubleshooting, not to mention searching in vain for decent answers on Bing, and far less on innovation and advancement.
A forced divestiture of Android, Google’s operating system for mobile phones and smart devices, would likely produce similarly bad outcomes. Like Chrome, Android is open source, which means developers can use its source code at no cost to create apps that work on the world’s 2.5 billion Android-powered mobile devices. Google maintains and constantly updates Android to ensure apps work properly and securely. There’s almost no way an independent Android would have the resources and expertise to maintain that level of maintenance. That means thousands of mobile app businesses and millions of customers with Android-powered devices would likely experience many more technical glitches and security breaches.
Then there’s the demand that Google share its search algorithms, results and data with competitors — another move likely to backfire, risking serious user privacy failures and data leaks, possibly to foreign rivals. Beyond that, if Google is forced to share its innovations with competitors, it will have little reason to continue innovating. That will lower the bar across the industry, depressing innovation and hurting consumers and U.S. tech leadership at a critical geopolitical moment. The same is true of the Justice Department’s bizarre request that Google be limited in using AI to improve its search capabilities.
Antitrust action is supposed to spur innovation and competition for the benefit of consumers, but forced divestment of Chrome and Android is a recipe for inhibiting innovation and reducing app quality, reliability and security. Forcing Google to share its algorithms and search results is a surefire way to disincentivize industrywide competition and innovation. Preventing Google, a global leader in tech research and development, from using AI to improve its search capabilities would have serious implications for U.S. tech innovation and leadership. The crowning absurdity? Kneecapping Google would likely mean handing market dominance to an even bigger Big Tech rival, Microsoft.
Destroying something imperfect is a far cry from creating something better. I urge Judge Mehta to focus on solutions that directly address the contractual problems he identified. The Justice Department presented its radical remedies as the cure for monopoly. Its “remedies” risk serious harm to competition and innovation, threatening developers, consumers and U.S. tech leadership.
• Developer Jake Ward is the board chair and co-founder of the Developers Alliance and founder of Data Protocol. He resides in Charleston, South Carolina.
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