The entrance to Google’s U.K. offices in London.
Olly Curtis | Future Publishing | via Getty Images
LONDON — Google is being sued for over £5 billion ($6.6 billion) in potential damages in the U.K. over allegations that the U.S. tech giant abused its “near-total dominance” in the online search market to drive up prices.
A class action lawsuit filed Wednesday in the U.K. Competition Appeal Tribunal claims that Google abused its position to restrict competing search engines and, in turn, bolster its dominant position in the market and make itself the only viable destination for online search advertising.
It is being brought by competition law academic Or Brook on behalf of hundreds of thousands of U.K.-based organizations that used Google’s search advertising services from Jan. 1, 2011, up until when the claim was filed. She is being represented by law firm Geradin Partners.
“Today, UK businesses and organisations, big or small, have almost no choice but to use Google ads to advertise their products and services,” Brook said in a statement Tuesday. “Regulators around the world have described Google as a monopoly and securing a spot on Google’s top pages is essential for visibility.
“Google has been leveraging its dominance in the general search and search advertising market to overcharge advertisers,” she added. “This class action is about holding Google accountable for its unlawful practices and seeking compensation on behalf of UK advertisers who have been overcharged.”
Google was not immediately available for comment when contacted by CNBC.
A 2020 market study from the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) — the U.K.’s competition regulator — found that 90% of all revenue in the search advertising market was earned by Google.
The lawsuit claims that Google has taken a number of steps to restrict competition in search, including entering into deals with smartphone makers to pre-install Google Search and Chrome on Android devices and paying Apple billions to ensure Google is the default search engine on its Safari browser.
It also alleges Google ensures its search management tool Search Ads 360 offers better functionality and more features with its own advertising products than that of competitors.
Big Tech under fire
It is the latest legal challenge for the American technology giant. U.S. Big Tech firms ranging from Google to Meta have been hit with a multitude of lawsuits, regulatory investigations and fines over concerns surrounding their sheer power and influence.
In 2018, Google was fined 4.3 billion euros ($4.9 billion) by the European Union for abusing the dominance of its Android mobile operating system by forcing smartphone makers to pre-install Chrome and Search in a bundle with its Play app store. Seven years on, Google is still appealing the antitrust penalty.
This week, an antitrust lawsuit brought by the Federal Trade Commission against Meta officially entered the courtroom in a landmark trial that could ultimately force the social media giant to sell its Instagram and WhatsApp platforms.
In January, the U.K.’s CMA raised concerns over competition issues in the cloud computing market, recommending an investigation into Amazon and Microsoft under a landmark competition law known as the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act.
That came after a class action lawsuit filed in December 2024 accused Microsoft of unfairly overcharging customers of rival cloud companies. The claimant in the case, competition lawyer Maria Luisa Stasi, is seeking more than £1 billion in compensation for firms affected.