Google Confirms It's A Target Of US DOJ Antitrust Probe, Apple And Facebook Could Be Next

Google parent company Alphabet has confirmed that it is under investigation by the United States Department of Justice. Specifically, the DOJ suspects Alphabet of antitrust practices, and is demanding all information and documents related to prior antitrust investigations involving the company around the globe. While the DOJ stated that it was just beginning to investigate major tech companies back in July 2019, we now know the department's efforts have kicked into high gear.


Alphabet and Google aren't the only major tech companies under the crosshair right now. Apple, Facebook, and Amazon are all known to be under investigation as well, and we wouldn't be surprised if other platforms like Twitter soon found themselves under scrutiny, too. President Trump has quite the love-hate relationship with Twitter, as he uses it frequently to announce major policy decisions and communicate with the general populous. He has also criticized the platform, however, (along with Google) with accusations of bias.

So, what does all of this mean for you, a consumer? For now, nothing. In the future, however, we're likely to see these bigger tech companies become more reigned-in. In the case of giants like Facebook and Google, who command a massive percentage of any given market as well as corporate entities, we wouldn't be surprised to see their empires divided.

Talk of breaking up companies like Facebook and Google has been rumbling for years now in political spheres. However, we'd be more surprised to see any damage done to their fundamental services; i.e. Google's Search/AdSense and Facebook's main social networking platforms. Fortunately for web users and advertisers at large, though, that scenario seems quite unlikely.