For more than a decade, Google has been quietly paying photographers to shoot 360-degree panoramas of businesses as part of its Street View program.Now these images are increasingly appearing on the maps, and they can sometimes be one of the first things users see in your listings (before they even reach your interior photos). That default position has been some of the most valuable internet real estate in the digital economy. Now, a federal judge is telling Google it no longer can lock that spot down for years at a time.
In a massive antitrust setback, the judge ruled that Google may only enter into all its default search and AI app contracts for Android devices in Europe on a rolling basis for no more than one year. That’s because deals with giants like Apple, Samsung, wireless carriers and browser makers — as well as device manufacturers — can’t operate on the long multiyear timelines that have helped to solidify Google’s stranglehold over billions of devices.
The ruling is the latest scorching rebuke to Mehta’s 2024 decision that Google had illegally monopolized online search and search advertising in violation of US antitrust law. Rather than rushing to break the company up, or requiring marquee products like Chrome (the most-used web browser in America) and Search to be spun off, the court has focused on attacking the pipes that feed Google its power: the exclusive and long-term agreements that made Google ubiquitous almost everywhere you turn.
In practical terms, the new decision compels Google to renew all those default placement deals anew every year. The company can continue to pay partners for placement — but it loses the security of exclusive multiyear contracts that effectively froze out competitors. Apple’s iPhone, Android phones made by Google rivals like Samsung and other devices that now come with Google as a built-in search option will now increasingly face decision points where competitors can try to muscle in.
That’s precisely what the judge wants. In an opinion in a written order, Mehta wrote that the “hard-and-fast termination requirement after one year” was needed to have remedies in the case actually bite and not just look strong on paper. What this basically means is that when Google has to come to the table and fight for a spot every year instead of resting on its laurels with multi-year contracts, then there’s a decent chance that other players could get their shot at those (currently empty) default slots.
Those new players, it turns out, are no longer just traditional search engines like Bing or DuckDuckGo. The decision comes at a time when generative AI companies are aggressively attempting to rethink how people search online. The AI powerhouse behind GPT is Link (OpenAI's browser focused on AI) has released its own web browser, Atlas. Perplexity is creating search products that answer questions directly, rather than spitting out an endless list of links. Opera is selling an AI-infused browser, called Opera One, that includes an assistant designed to help people control the web in voice. All of them can now make an argument for why they should get a shot at being the default in ways that weren’t realistic when Google’s contracts ran longer and blocked out rivals.
The new one-year rule also stacks on top of an entirely different set of restrictions Mehta already put into place in September. In that previous remedies order, he also banned Google from making exclusive default search deals and mandating that it share some of its search-ranking data with competitors for a while — all under the guise of ensuring other companies could actually compete on the merits. Those decisions together form a pincer attack: Reel in Google’s ability to completely lock up distribution, and push the company to unclench its control over the data advantage that has been responsible for making its results so difficult to compete with.
The stakes are huge. Google has reportedly paid over $10 billion a year to companies like Apple over the years for prime default search placement on devices and in browsers. Those payments have been so hefty that they have themselves become line-item stories on earnings calls and in antitrust filings. Rebidding those deals annually injects doubt into a revenue stream that has been remarkably consistent for both parties. It also alters the leverage equations. If Apple or another recipient of the service knows that those providing default access might have to compete for it, they can take bids from other grasping hands more seriously.
The effect for consumers could be slow in coming, but potentially real. Finally, in the short term, your phone isn’t going to suddenly start using a totally different default search engine (sorry call back) overnight that upends the regulatory body of work that forced Google to make this change. Contracts still need to be renegotiated, companies still have reasons not to fix what isn’t broken and Google’s product is still broadly considered best-in-class. However, in time, the mix of annual rebids and nonexclusive rules could mean more choice screens would offer not just more viable options locally or in specific sectors but also perhaps AI-forward search tools or other third-party offerings as defaults rather than niche add-ons.
The ruling is another signal to Google that its days of coddled dominance are over. The company has already indicated it will appeal a number of antitrust decisions, including those related to its search empire and the Play Store business. But inwardly, executives must now look to a future in which default distribution is not just not a largely predictable asset anymore but also an ongoing liability that must be defended year after year.
It’s also a message that ricochets well beyond Mountain View. Regulators and politicians in the United States and overseas have struggled with what effective tech antitrust enforcement might mean in an era when markets are defined as much by defaults and contracts as prices. This remedy attempts to thread a needle: It falls short of breaking up the company, but it zeroes in on the machinery that relegated rivals to the sidelines. If it succeeds, it could serve as a blueprint for how courts treat other platforms that use exclusive contracts or long-term distribution deals to hold onto power.
Of course, there remains a great deal of uncertainty. Appeals might soften the remedies or slow their full implementation. For companies that hope to compete with Google for default positions, having just ambition won’t cut it; they require serious investment and technology, and the resolve to function under a harsh spotlight. And people are notoriously slow to adapt when it comes to everyday digital habits. Just because people were offered a choice doesn’t mean they will pick something new.
But the trend is evident. For the first time in forever, Google’s being the default choice up and down your phone, your browser and your devices isn’t just a business deal between two companies. It’s a legal issue currently being forced by the courts. And thanks to this week’s ruling, that question won’t be settled once a decade in backroom negotiations. You will have to answer it every year.
