Alphabet's Google Braces For Antitrust Investigation From The Justice Department

The U.S. Justice Department is preparing for an antitrust investigation of Alphabet Inc. GOOGGOOGL’s Google.

Officials from the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission, which also enforces antitrust law, let in recent weeks to give the Justice Department jurisdiction over Google.

According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, the potential investigation will focus on accusations that Google gave preference to its own businesses in searches.

Not The First Time

This is not the company’s first run in with antitrust allegations. In 2013, the FTC closed an investigation of Google, where the company agreed to end the practice of scraping reviews and other data from rivals websites in favor of its own products.

Google was fined 2.4 billion Euros in 2017 for unfairly promoting its own shopping service. The company was also hit with a record $5.1 billion antitrust fine from the EU in 2018. 

TripAdvisor Inc TRIP CEO Stephen Kaufer welcomed the news in a statement.

"TripAdvisor remains concerned about Google’s practices in the United States, the EU and throughout the world," Kaufer said. "For the good of consumers and competition on the internet, we welcome any renewed interest by U.S. regulators into Google's anticompetitive behavior."

The decision made by the Justice Department could ultimately have wide reaching effects on the world’s largest tech companies and their anti-competitive practices.

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