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DOJ to ask judge to force Google to sell off Chrome, Bloomberg News reports
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DOJ to ask judge to force Google to sell off Chrome, Bloomberg News reports
Nov 19, 2024 9:28 PM

WASHINGTON, Nov 18 (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of

Justice will ask a judge to force Alphabet's Google to

sell off its Chrome internet browser, Bloomberg News reported on

Monday, citing people familiar with the plans.

The DOJ will also ask the judge, who ruled in August that

Google illegally monopolized the search market, to require

measures related to artificial intelligence and its Android

smartphone operating system, the report said.

The DOJ declined to comment. Google, in a statement from

Lee-Anne Mulholland, Vice President, Google Regulatory Affairs,

said the DOJ is pushing a "radical agenda that goes far beyond

the legal issues in this case," and would harm consumers.

The move would be one of the most aggressive attempts by the

Biden administration to curb what it alleges are Big Tech

monopolies.

Ultimately, however, the re-election of Donald Trump to the

presidency could have the greatest impact over the case.

Two months before the election, Trump claimed he would

prosecute Google for what he perceives as bias against him. But

a month later, Trump questioned whether breaking up the company

was a good idea.

The company plans to appeal once U.S. District Judge Amit

Mehta makes a final ruling, which he is likely to do by August

2025.

Prosecutors had floated a range of potential remedies in the

case, from ending exclusive agreements where Google pays

billions of dollars annually to Apple Inc and other

companies to remain the default search engine on tablets and

smart phones, all the way to divesting parts of its business,

such as its Chrome browser and Android operating system.

Google maintains its search engine has won users with its

quality, adding that it faces robust competition from Amazon ( AMZN )

and other sites and users can choose other search

engines as their default.

The government has the option to decide whether a Chrome

sale is necessary at a later date if some of the other aspects

of the remedy create a more competitive market, the Bloomberg

report said.

(Reporting by Jasper Ward in Washington and Niket Nishant in

Bengaluru; Editing by Costas Pitas, Arun Koyyur and Lincoln

Feast.)

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