DuckDuckGo Prepares To Face Antitrust Trials That Determine Against Google

DuckDuckGo prepares to fight Google's hegemony in internet search engines. (photo: twitter @duckduckgo)

DuckDuckGo, who has long complained that Google's tactics make it difficult to get their search engine usage on mobile phones, will be one of many competitors to an online search giant ready to face a once-in-a-lifetime antitrust hearing scheduled to start on Tuesday, September 12.

The United States will argue that Google is not playing fairly in its bid to dominate online searches in a hearing that is seen as a fight for the "Internet soul".

The US Department of Justice is expected to explain how Google pays billions of dollars annually to device manufacturers like Apple Inc., wireless companies like AT&T, and browser makers like Mozilla to keep Google's search engine for the best.

DuckDuckGo has also complained, for example, that deleting Google as a default search engine on devices and replacing it with DuckDuckGo requires too many steps, keeping their market share only about 2.3%.

DuckDuckGo, Microsoft, and Yahoo are on Google's long list of competitors who will closely monitor the hearing.

"Google makes it too difficult to use DuckDuckGo by default. We are pleased that this issue will eventually be brought to justice," said DuckDuckGo spokesman Kamyl Bazbaz, who said Google had "strong control over its main distribution point for more than a decade."

Google itself has denied wrongdoing and is preparing to defend itself firmly over all those lawsuits.

This legal battle has a huge impact on Big Tech, accused of buying or dropping small competitors but has protected itself from many allegations that violate antitrust law because of the services the companies provide to users are free, as happened to Alphabet's Google and Facebook, or at low prices, as happened to Amazon.com.

"It is difficult to overestimate the importance of this case, especially for monopolies and companies with significant market share," antitrust attorney Luke Hasskamp told Reuters.

"This is going to be a big case, especially for big tech companies in the world (Google, Apple, Twitter, and others), which have grown to have too big a role in almost all aspects of our lives," he added.

Previous antitrust hearings that had similar levels of importance including Microsoft cases, filed in 1998, and AT&T, were filed in 1974. The 1982 AT&T breaking was recognized as a way opener for the modern mobile phone industry while fighting with Microsoft was recognized as a way opener for Google and other companies on the internet.

Congress tried to limit Big Tech last year but largely failed. They considered legislation to oversee the market power of those companies, such as legislation to prevent them from giving preference to their own products, but failed to get past the most aggressive of them.

Big Tech's rival now relies on Judge Amit Mehta, who was nominated by former US President Barack Obama for the US District Court for the District of Columbia.

The lawsuit to be heard brought up by former Justice Department President Donald Trump. In a rare show of bipartisan agreement, President Joe Biden's Department of Justice has filed the lawsuit and filed a second lawsuit against Google in January focusing on advertising technology. Read more

Judge Mehta will decide whether Google has violated antitrust law in this first trial, and if so, what to do. The government has asked judges to stop all illegal Google activities but also encourage "the necessary structural easing," which raises the possibility that the tech giant could be required to split.

The government's strongest argument is against Google's revenue sharing agreement with Android creators, requiring Google to be the only search engine on smartphones in exchange for percentage revenue from search advertising, said Daniel McCuaig, a partner at Cohen Milstein who previously worked at the US Department of Justice's Antitrust Division.