
Fifty attorneys general are joining an investigation into Google over possible antitrust violations, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the initiative’s leader, announced Monday.
The news confirms reports last week about the bipartisan investigation into Google’s practices. The probe includes attorneys general from 48 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. California and Alabama are not involved in the probe, Paxton said at a press conference.
Other attorneys general at the media conference emphasized Google’s dominance in the ad market and use of consumer data.
“When there is no longer a free market or competition, this increases prices, even when something is marketed as free, and harms consumers,” said Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody, a Republican. “Is something really free if we are increasingly giving over our privacy information? Is something really free if online ad prices go up based on one company’s control?”
An antitrust probe into Facebook was announced on Friday by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who will lead the case. Attorneys general from seven states plus the District of Columbia are participating in the Facebook investigation.
At the press conference Monday, D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine, a Democrat, said it “remains to be seen” if the two probes will be “a coordinated expansion.”
The state investigations put an additional layer of pressure on both companies, which are already facing antitrust scrutiny on the federal level. Facebook confirmed an antitrust probe by the Federal Trade Commission in July after the agency slapped it with a $5 billion fine over its privacy practices. And the Department of Justice will conduct its own antitrust investigation into Google, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The attorneys general involved in the Google probe said their investigation would remain independent from those of other areas of government.