Google is being sued in Britain for potential damages of up to £5 billion ($6.6 billion) in a class action alleging the company abused its dominant market position in online search.
The class action, filed at the Competition Appeal Tribunal Tuesday, argues that Google’s actions enabled it to charge higher prices for the advertisements that appear in search inquiries than it otherwise could in a competitive market.
It said the US company, owned by Alphabet (GOOGL), contracted phone makers to pre-install Google Search and the Chrome browser on Android devices and paid Apple to make it the default search engine on iPhones, with the intention of shutting out competition.
The claim, filed by competition law expert Or Brook on behalf of thousands of businesses, alleges Google ensured its search engine had better functionality and more features for Google’s own advertising offering than that of its competitors.
Google said this was “yet another speculative and opportunistic case.”
“We will argue against it vigorously,” a spokesperson said. “Consumers and advertisers use Google because it is helpful, not because there are no alternatives.”
Brook said businesses had almost no choice but to use Google ads to advertise their products and services.
“Regulators around the world have described Google as a monopoly and securing a spot on Google’s top pages is essential for visibility,” she said in a statement. “Google has been leveraging its dominance in the general search and search advertising market to overcharge advertisers.”
Britain’s antitrust regulator launched an investigation into Google’s search services, including their impact on advertising markets, in January.
The country’s Competition and Markets Authority said at the time that millions of people and businesses relied on Google’s services, which accounted for 90% of searches and were used by more than 200,000 UK businesses to advertise.
