Every major US technology company has been the subject of law enforcement action in the past six years. Google has been held liable in no fewer than three cases for monopolising search, advertising and the Android ecosystem. Antitrust cases are pending against Meta, Amazon and Apple. Yet despite this, little is likely to change. A case in point is the recent ruling in the US government’s case against Google.

Despite finding that Google violated antitrust law for years and that its illegal acts directly contributed to maintaining its monopoly power, Judge Amit Mehta decided that the remedy would be limited to an order preventing Google from continuing some — but not all — of its anti-competitive behaviour.