Washington AG Joins DOJ's Online Ad Antitrust Case Against Google

Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson (D) joined DOJ and eight plaintiff states in their digital advertising antitrust case (docket 1:23-cv-00108) against Google in U.S. District Court for Eastern Virginia in Alexandria, said Ferguson's office in a Monday news release. DOJ and Virginia, California, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Tennessee sued Google in January (see Ref:2301240055)] alleging it unlawfully monopolized online display advertising. Plaintiffs aim to break up Google’s alleged monopolization of the online display advertising market. Newspapers depend on online advertising as an important source of revenue, but Google’s dominance of online display advertising has allowed it to funnel more business through its services, resulting in websites earning less and advertisers paying more, Ferguson said. He cited a Washington state Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee report showing state newspaper revenue declined by about 30% between 2015 and 2020. The DOJ lawsuit asserts Google violated the Sherman Antitrust Act’s prohibitions against monopolization after its acquisition of DoubleClick, which controlled 60% of online advertising when it bought it in 2008. Federal regulators allowed the purchase then because they believed enough alternatives existed that there would still be competition, Ferguson said. After Google acquired DoubleClick, Google launched its own branded advertising tools and made DoubleClick available only to advertisers who used its internal ad buying tools, plaintiffs allege. Google used exclusive agreements with other tech companies, bought other competing online advertising technologies, and forced advertisers and website publishers to use only its products, which plaintiffs allege “suppressed competition and allowed Google to dominate the online advertising market.”