Adam Kovacevich, the CEO and founder of the tech industry coalition Chamber of Progress, said the Department of Justice's (DOJ) statements about the Russian government show that its case against Google has derailed. During day three of arguments in their antitrust trial against Google, DOJ attorneys commended the Russian government for implementing a choice screen for search engines.
"How do you know the DOJ's antitrust case against Google has gone off the rails?" Kovacevich tweeted. "When DOJ approvingly cites the actions of the Russian government, which has the most blatantly protectionist record of any global antitrust enforcer."
Carl Szabo, the general counsel for NetChoice, is covering the antitrust case and said in a post on X that the attorneys with the DOJ's Civil Rights Division promoted the Russian government's institution of a "choice screen" for search engines. The DOJ said that after implementing the choice screen, the Russian search engine Yandex performed better.
The Committee to Unleash Prosperity describes Yandex as "a propaganda tool for Putin."
Kovacevich said in a post on X that Yandex had commanded 60% of search engine traffic for desktops in Russia, but after Google started leading on Android, Yandex flagged "Russian enforcers" in 2015.
Yandex asked a Russian regulator to investigate Google's Android operating system, asserting that Google's position as the default search engine for Androids constituted a violation of Russia's antitrust laws, TechCrunch reported.
The Russian regulator then found Google guilty of violating its anti-competition laws, which boosted Yandex's stock, TechCrunch reported. Russian regulator Alexey Dotsenko said Russia would officially order Google to "terminate abuse of dominant position.”
