Google has handed over more than 100,000 pages of documents to the state of Texas, but investigators in the antitrust division of the Texas Attorney General’s Office want more. They say the tech giant isn’t fully cooperating, according to a report over the weekend in the Wall Street Journal.
The Texas Attorney General in September launched an investigation of tech giant Google’s business practices to see whether they comply with state and federal antitrust laws.
The investigators are probing “Google’s overarching control of online advertising markets and search traffic that may have led to anticompetitive behavior that harms consumers,” according to a statement at the time the probe was launched.
“Now, more than ever, information is power, and the most important source of information in Americans’ day-to-day lives is the internet. When most Americans think of the internet, they no doubt think of Google,” said Attorney General Paxton.
“There is nothing wrong with a business becoming the biggest game in town if it does so through free market competition, but we have seen evidence that Google’s business practices may have undermined consumer choice, stifled innovation, violated users’ privacy, and put Google in control of the flow and dissemination of online information,” he added
Texas’ probe is supported by investigators of other states as well.
According to a Google spokeswoman quoted in the Wall Street Journal on Saturday, Google has cooperated with the probe. “To date, Texas has requested, and we have provided, over 100,000 pages of information,” the spokeswoman said.
But other sources told the Journal that “Google is resisting efforts to surrender emails, text messages and other documents sought by state investigators.”
The Texas Attorney General’s Office says that its investigation is more sweeping even than three antitrust actions brought previously by the European Commission, which resulted in over €8 billion in fines. The AG’s office says, “None of these previous investigations… fully address the source of Google’s sustained market power and the ability to engage in serial and repeated business practices with the intention to protect and maintain (its) power.”
