After the U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against search engine operator Google last year in cooperation with eleven U.S. states, Google is now expected to hand over extensive data as part of the competition lawsuit.
Government demands too broad
The U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against Google last October because the government sees possible violations of competition law by the company. The previous eleven U.S. states involved have now been joined by others, including Google’s home state of California. As part of the lawsuit, the investigating judges are seeking the search results and associated advertisements that were played out in the period from February 2 to 8, 2015 and from February 03 to 09, 2020. In particular, the judges want to see the users‘ search queries, the advertisements displayed, and the composition of ad prices for advertisers.
Violation of the Sherman Act
With the U.S. government’s input, they want about 80 different pieces of data from Google...
