Google hit with another antitrust case, this time for ads business

When it rains, it pours. Big tech antitrust lawsuits, that is.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Wednesday that the state is filing a lawsuit against Google for monopolistic business practices. He accused Google of taking advantage of its market dominance by demanding an unfair cut of revenue from publishers that place Google ad modules on their websites, as well as manipulating ad prices. According to the New York Times, other states are planning to join the suit.

Google said it plans to “strongly defend” itself in court. The company claims that it faces plenty of competition in providing ad services.

“Attorney General Paxton’s ad tech claims are meritless, yet he’s gone ahead in spite of all the facts,” a Google spokesperson said via email. “We’ve invested in state-of-the-art ad tech services that help businesses and benefit consumers. Digital ad prices have fallen over the last decade. Ad tech fees are falling too. Google’s ad tech fees are lower than the industry average. These are the hallmarks of a highly competitive industry.”

This is the second antitrust lawsuit Google faces. In October, the federal government and 11 states jointly filed a suit against Google for the contracts it brokered with Android manufacturers, Apple, and others to make Google the default search engine on Safari and other browsers. Google vehemently disputes the claim.

Google isn’t alone in its troubles. Last week, the federal government and states sued Facebook for violating antitrust law by crushing competition through acquisitions. They called for Facebook to divest ownership of Instagram and WhatsApp. Apple and Amazon are also under investigation. 

While details on the new Google suit are scarce at the moment, in a video announcing the lawsuit, Paxton said “if the free market were a baseball game, Google positioned itself as the pitcher, the batter, and the umpire.”

Attorneys general in Colorado and Nebraska are reportedly filing a suit against Google for giving competitors with their own search functions (like Amazon or Yelp) less prime placement than Google’s own results, according to Politico. It’s not clear if this is all part of one complaint, or separate.

This story is developing…