For context and as someone who has closely followed the Google antitrust cases over the last several years, this is a significant development, especially for anyone whose customer acquisition channel is Google Ads.
While Google has already been held liable for maintaining a monopoly by two federal judges, the court did not allow advertisers to proceed with a class action because of the arbitration provision referenced in this article. Essentially, Google’s contracts forced advertisers into individual arbitration instead of a class action, even though Google was found to have acted in violation of antitrust laws and likely owes advertisers a recovery for overcharges.
The mass arbitration is a very creative workaround. And because these are federal antitrust violations, treble damages may apply. That means the actual recovery could be up to 3x whatever the overcharge was. The article mentions an economist estimated total claims could reach $218 billion.
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For context and as someone who has closely followed the Google antitrust cases over the last several years, this is a significant development, especially for anyone whose customer acquisition channel is Google Ads.
While Google has already been held liable for maintaining a monopoly by two federal judges, the court did not allow advertisers to proceed with a class action because of the arbitration provision referenced in this article. Essentially, Google’s contracts forced advertisers into individual arbitration instead of a class action, even though Google was found to have acted in violation of antitrust laws and likely owes advertisers a recovery for overcharges.
The mass arbitration is a very creative workaround. And because these are federal antitrust violations, treble damages may apply. That means the actual recovery could be up to 3x whatever the overcharge was. The article mentions an economist estimated total claims could reach $218 billion.