Additionally, the DOJ wants Mehta to stop Google from making any self-biases, such as mandating an AI product on Google-operated Android devices or preventing a rival from being distributed on Android devices.
The government seems very concerned that Google could use its ownership of Android to play games in the emerging AI sector. They further recommended an order to prevent Google from discouraging partners from working with rivals, degrading the quality of rivals' AI products on Android devices, or otherwise “coercing” manufacturers or other Android partners to give Google's AI products 'better treatment'.
Importantly, if the court orders AI assets related to Google's control of Android, Google could be at risk of a forced sale of Android if Mehta grants the DOJ's request for “conditional structural relief” that would support the divestiture of Android required if behavioral solutions do not destroy current monopolies.
Finally, the government wants Google to be required to allow publishers to opt out of AI training without affecting their search results. (Currently, disabling AI scraping automatically excludes sites from Google search indexing.)
All this, the DOJ claimed, is necessary to pave the way for a booming search market as AI will upend the competitive landscape.
“The promise of new technologies, including advances in artificial intelligence (AI), may provide an opportunity for new competition,” the DOJ said in a court filing. “But only a comprehensive set of remedies can thaw the ecosystem and ultimately reverse years of anti-competitive effects.”
At the status conference Tuesday, DOJ attorney David Dahlquist reiterated to Mehta that these fixes are necessary so that Google's illegal search behavior does not extend to this “new frontier” of search, Law360 reported. Dahlquist also clarified that the DOJ views these types of AI products “as new entry points for search, rather than as an entirely new market.”
