SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 15 — Top bosses of Google and Facebook were directly involved in approving an allegedly illegal 2018 deal to cement their dominance of the online advertising market, US court documents revealed yesterday.
The legal documents filed in a New York court clearly refer to Sundar Pichai, chief of Google’s parent firm Alphabet, as well as Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg and CEO Mark Zuckerberg — even if their names were redacted.The documents note that the economic terms were emailed to Facebook’s CEO and he was advised: “‘We’re nearly ready to sign and need your approval to move forward.’”
“Meta’s non-exclusive bidding agreement with Google and the similar agreements we have with other bidding platforms, have helped to increase competition for ad placements,” a spokesperson said in reply to an AFP inquiry. “No rational developer would choose to have its auctions rigged by the market’s two largest buyers,” the suit said.The antitrust suit is one of three engaging Google on different fronts.