Google is barred from exclusive search engine contracts but does not have to break up,

Google must share data with rivals to open up competition in online search, a judge in Washington ruled on Tuesday.

However, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta rejected a demand from Donald Trump‘s Justice Department to break up the internet giant by forcing it to sell off its Chrome browser.

It was the culmination of a landmark antitrust case that imposed measures on Google, but fell short of what the government asked for.

The decision came a year after Judge Mehta found that Google illegally operated monopolies in online search and related advertising by paying billions of dollars a year for exclusive deals with smartphone makers.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai had claimed that data-sharing measures sought by the Justice Department could allow the tech giant’s rivals to reverse-engineer its technology.

The company has already said it will appeal and that means it could be years before Google has to comply with the judge’s ruling.

In a 223-page decision the judge also said Google would not have to sell off its Android operating system.

He wrote: ‘Google will not be required to divest Chrome; nor will the court include a contingent divestiture of the Android operating system in the final judgment.

‘Plaintiffs overreached in seeking forced divesture of these key assets, which Google did not use to effect any illegal restraints.’ 

Trump’s Justice Department, headed by Attorney General Pam Bondi, had argued that the Chrome browser is a key gateway to the internet and facilitates a third of all Google web searches. 

But the judge said forcing a sale of it would be ‘incredibly messy.’

His ruling made it easier for device makers, and others who set search as a default to load apps created by Google’s rivals, by barring the tech giant from entering exclusive contracts. 

However, Google ‘will not be barred from making payments or offering other consideration to distribution partners for preloading or placement of Search, Chrome, or its GenAI products,’ the judge wrote.

Following the ruling, shares in Alphabet, Google’s parent company, jumped 8 percent.

Shares in Apple also immediately rose 4 percent.

A focus of the case was agreements Google made paying billions of dollars for Apple, Samsung, and other smartphone makers to use it as the default search engine on their products. 

In 2021 it paid $26 billion to be the search engine that comes up automatically on browsers including Apple’s Safari and Mozilla’s Firefox.

The Justice Department maintained that exclusivity led to more people using Google, allowing it to collect more data, and move even further ahead of its rivals.

Last year, Judge Mehta said Google’s default status on the iPhone had enabled it to increase its position as an internet powerhouse, and insulated it from competitive threats.

The latest ruling made it easier for device makers, and others who set Google search as a default, to load apps created by its rivals, by barring the company from entering exclusive contracts.

The ruling also addressed the emerging threat from generative artificial intelligence chatbots like ChatGPT, extending restrictions to prevent Google from using exclusive deals to dominate AI.

However, Judge Mehta also decided that banning payments from Google outright could have too serious an impact on other businesses.

He wrote: ‘Google will not be barred from making payments or offering other consideration to distribution partners for preloading or placement of Google Search, Chrome, or its GenAI products.

‘Cutting off payments from Google almost certainly will impose substantial, in some cases crippling, downstream harms to distribution partners, related markets, and consumers.’

Elsewhere in the ruling, he ordered Google to hand over search index data and user interaction information that rivals can use to improve their services.

Google must also offer syndication of search results to competitors.

The judgment was widely regarded as one of the most significant against corporate monopoly practices in the last two decades. 

However, overall, it was also seen by experts as largely in favor of Google and fell short of expectations from some observers that there would be more radical changes imposed on the tech giant.  

Professor Carl Tobias of the University of Richmond Law School in Virginia, said: ‘It sounds like the judge felt that it was too draconian to provide some of the remedies that prosecutors or the Department of Justice wanted.

‘Google is certainly not going to be broken up, and it’s not clear that its business model is going to change a whole lot.’ 

Gene Munster, managing partner, at investment company Deepwater Asset Management, said: ‘The regulator’s bark is bigger than the bite.’

In a statement, Google said: ‘Now the Court has imposed limits on how we distribute Google services, and will require us to share Search data with rivals.

‘We have concerns about how these requirements will impact our users and their privacy, and we’re reviewing the decision closely. The court did recognize that divesting Chrome and Android would have gone beyond the case’s focus on search distribution, and would have harmed consumers and our partners.’ 

A spokesman for the Justice Department said the requirements for Google to share data with competitors were ‘significant.’

The spokesman added: ‘The court’s ruling recognizes the need for remedies that will pry open the market for general search services, which has been frozen in place for over a decade.

‘The ruling also recognizes the need to prevent Google from using the same anticompetitive tactics for its GenAI products as it used to monopolize the search market.’

In April, Google lost a separate antitrust case over digital advertising.

A judge in Virginia ruled the tech giant illegally built ‘monopoly power,’ handing a victory to online news publishers.

That case was also brought by the U.S. Justice Department, and the Daily Mail’s Chief Digital Officer Matthew Wheatland was a key witness.

Bondi called that case a ‘landmark victory in the ongoing fight to stop Google from monopolizing the digital public square.’

She added: ‘Google is a monopolist and has abused its monopoly power.’

The Google cases are part of a wider government move against alleged monopolistic practices by technology giants.

It has support from both Republicans and Democrats, and involves cases launched under both President Trump and President Joe Biden.

There are currently five pending antitrust cases brought by the U.S. government against major technology companies including Meta, Apple and Amazon.