“Combined with the other recent lawsuits filed against Google, never before have so many states and the federal government come together to challenge a company with such power,” Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller said a statement. “Google has more data on consumers, and more variety of information, than perhaps any entity in history.”
The Justice Department and 11 Republican state attorneys general sued Google on Oct. 20 in the most significant monopolization case in more than two decades. That case focuses on Google’s agreements with Apple Inc. and other device makers and partners to provide Google search as a default to users. Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said during a virtual press conference Thursday that the new case goes beyond the Justice Department’s complaint. Unlike the U.S. complaint, the states target Google’s conduct in specialized search services, such as Yelp Inc., saying the company cut off competition from those competitors and made it harder for users to access information from them. Weiser said that the states will move to consolidate the suit with the federal case.