Washington: A total of 36 US states and Washington DC have filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing the giant control of search engines on the Android application store violating antimonopoly laws.
Law demands accuse that through a series of exclusive contracts and other anticompompetitive behaviors on the Google Play Store, Google has lost user Android devices from strong competitions that can cause greater choice and innovation, and far lower prices for mobile applications.
New York Attorney General James and Coalition – Led by lawyers General Utah, North Carolina, and Tennessee – also accuse Google which requires application developers who sell digital content in the application through the application purchased by Google Billing as an intermediary, forcing the application consumers to pay for commissions Google – up to 30 percent – without limits.
“Google has served as an internet gatekeeper for years, but, recently, it has also become the gatekeeper of our digital device – produce all of us paying more for the software we use every day,” alleged James.
“Again, we see Google using its dominance to improve competition and illegally profit for billions.
Through illegal behavior, the company has ensured that hundreds of millions of Android users turn to Google, and only Google, for millions of applications they can choose to download to cellphones And their tablets, “he said.
“Even worse, Google squeezes a collection of life from millions of small businesses that only try to compete.
We filed this lawsuit to end the power of illegal monopoly Google and eventually vote to millions of consumers and business owners,” James said.
This lawsuit alleges that Google frees technical barriers that are very inhibiting or fully prevent third-party application developers from distributing applications outside the Google Play Store.
In particular, Google builds into a series of misleading security warnings and other obstacles that prevent users from downloading applications from any source outside the Google Play Store, effectively include application developers and application stores from direct distribution to consumers, he accused.
Google has not allowed Android to serve as “Open Source” for years, effectively deciding potential competition.
Google forces OEMs who want to design their devices to use Android to enter an agreement called “Android Compatibility Commitment” or ACC.
Under this agreement “Take or Leave”, OEM must promise not to create or implement a variant or Android version that deviates from Google’s version of Android, the lawsuit accuses.
This lawsuit accused Google “buying” potential competition in the market for application distribution.
“Google application developers forces and application users both use Google – Google Play Billing processing services – To process any payment for the purchase of digital content made in the application obtained through the Google Play Store,” he said.
“Thus, Google is illegally binding the use of Google payment processors – which is a separate service in a separate market for payment processing in the application – to distribution through the Google Play Store.
By forcing this tie, Google can extract exorbitant processing fees for each transaction, As high as 30 percent, and many times higher than payment processing costs charged in competitive markets, “he thought.
36 US countries filed a lawsuit against Google
