Or Brook, a competition law expert representing hundreds of thousands of British companies, has filed a $6.6 billion class action lawsuit against Google. According to the plaintiffs, Google has been abusing its dominant position in the online search market by restricting competition and artificially inflating advertising prices.
The lawsuit covers British businesses that placed advertisements through Google between 2011 and 2025. According to the documents, Google signed agreements with smartphone manufacturers to ensure its search engine and Chrome browser were pre-installed on Android devices. Additionally, the company allegedly paid billions of dollars to Apple to have its search engine set as the default in the Safari browser.
According to Brook, such practices limited the ability of companies to access alternative advertising platforms, forcing them to pay inflated prices to Google. In other words, businesses were deprived of access to a fair and competitive advertising market.
Google has dismissed the claims as "speculative and opportunistic" and has vowed to defend itself in court.
It is worth noting that this is not the first time Google has faced antitrust accusations over its dominant position in the digital advertising and search sectors. The European Commission fined the company billions of euros in 2017, 2018, and 2019 for similar reasons, although some of these fines were later overturned by courts.
