Technology
Federal judge denies Justice Department request to force Google ad tech divestiture
A federal court in Virginia opted for behavioral remedies rather than ordering the sale of Google's AdX marketplace following an antitrust trial.
The short version
- U.S. Judge Leonie Brinkema rejected a bid by federal and state antitrust enforcers to force Alphabet's Google to sell its AdX ad exchange.
- The court approved the majority of the behavioral remedies proposed by the parties following an earlier finding of illegal monopoly power in advertising technology.
- Google had argued that a divestiture would harm customers and cause severe technical disruption, while the Justice Department maintained Google could not be trusted to manage the exchange.
- The decision marks another instance where federal antitrust regulators have failed to secure structural breakups of major technology companies in court.
Key facts
- U.S. Judge Leonie Brinkema of Alexandria, Virginia, denied a request by the U.S. Department of Justice and a coalition of states to order the sale of Google's ad exchange, AdX.[Slashdot]
- The judge accepted the majority of the behavioral remedies submitted by the parties instead of imposing a structural breakup.[Slashdot]
- The remedy decision follows an April 2025 finding by Judge Brinkema that Google maintained illegal monopolies in publisher ad servers and ad exchanges, unlawfully tying publishers to AdX.[Slashdot]
- The Department of Justice and state attorneys general originally filed the antitrust lawsuit against Google's advertising technology business in 2023.[Slashdot]
- This ruling is the third consecutive instance in which a U.S. court has rejected government antitrust requests to break up a major technology company, following a similar ruling denying a forced sale of Google's Chrome browser.[Slashdot]
What remains uncertain
- The specific operational terms and implementation timeline of the approved behavioral remedies were not detailed in initial reporting.[Slashdot]