The Federal Trade Commission is preparing a potential antitrust lawsuit against Amazon Inc. that in the coming months could challenge an array of the tech giant’s business practices as anticompetitive, according to people familiar with the matter. The timing of any case remains in flux, some of the people said. The commission also could opt not to proceed, and doesn’t always bring cases even when it is making preparations to do so.
A federal judge eviscerated arguments by more than 40 state attorneys general that Facebook had a monopoly.
A federal judge’s dismissal of the Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust lawsuit against Facebook is posing the first big test for President Biden’s new FTC Chair Lina Khan. But the renowned big tech critic faces a serious time crunch, with less than 30 days to try and shift the momentum through a revamped lawsuit.
A federal judge today dismissed the Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust lawsuit against Facebook, concluding that the government failed to establish that the tech platform had a monopoly on social media networks. The judge, James E. Boasberg, still left open the possibility that the government could revive the case by amending its complaint.
Facebook is asking a D.C. federal judge to dismiss two government suits that allege its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp gave it a monopoly on the personal social networking market in violation of antitrust laws — arguing that such a claim “utterly ignores the reality of the dynamic, intensely competitive high-tech industry in which Facebook operates.”
Exclusives
Google is pushing back in court this week on antitrust claims brought against it by the Justice Department two months ago. In a legal filing with the U.S. District Court […]
Facebook and Google agreed to “cooperate and assist one another” if they ever faced an investigation into their pact to work together in online advertising, according to an unredacted version of a lawsuit filed by 10 states against Google last week.
The judge hearing the U.S. Justice Department’s antitrust case against Alphabet Inc.’s Google suggested a trial date of Sept. 12, 2023, on Friday. U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta suggested the date during a status conference, and counsel for the two sides did not object. Mehta noted that the two sides appeared to expect that discovery would be completed in March 2022, with other pretrial matters not addressed until early 2023.
A bipartisan group of state attorneys general filed another antitrust lawsuit against Google on Thursday focused on its online search market power, adding to the growing legal battles facing the tech giant. The lawsuit — filed by 35 states and Washington, D.C., Guam and Puerto Rico — alleges Google illegally maintains monopoly power over search engines and search advertising markets through a series of anticompetitive contracts and conduct.
The Federal Trade Commission has frozen pay and hiring, explored ways of shrinking its staff, and may need to bring fewer expensive cases, its executive director says in internal emails.
The U.S. and states cases against the social network are far from a slam dunk because the standards of proof are formidable.
The antitrust lawsuits were announced by the Federal Trade Commission and New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Google has asked a judge to dismiss an antitrust lawsuit brought by a group of marketers that allege the company monopolized “online display advertising services.” “The whole is no greater than the sum of the parts, and the amalgam does not add up to a monopolization claim,” Google argues in papers filed Monday with U.S. District Court Judge Beth Labson Freeman in San Jose.
The U.S. Supreme Court won’t review an antitrust case that could have outsized influence on the future of the television industry. On Monday, the high court announced it wouldn’t be hearing National Football League v. Ninth Inning, a lawsuit against the professional football league that challenges how teams currently pool telecast rights and collectively negotiate a licensing package for out-of-market games. The antitrust dispute could shake up live sports broadcasting.
Alphabet’s Google must tell a district court how it will respond to a federal antitrust lawsuit by mid-November, with the two sides making initial disclosures later in the month, U.S. Judge Amit Mehta said in a brief order on Friday. The U.S. Justice Department sued Google on Oct. 20 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, accusing the $1 trillion company of illegally using its market muscle to hobble rivals in the biggest challenge to the power and influence of Big Tech in decades.
Comcast Tries To Squash Antitrust Lawsuit
Comcast has moved to dismiss an antitrust lawsuit filed by Altitude TV by shooting down claims that the cable operator has refused to deal with the Denver-based regional sports network and that the cable op has a monopolistic pay-TV position in the market.
The streamer alleges that ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC are engaged in sham copyright litigation and are colluding to deny consumers over-the-air signals they once committed to make freely available.
An Alabama law firm that advertised on television is accusing the six biggest owners of TV stations — Sinclair Broadcast Group, Tribune Media, Gray Television, Hearst Corp., Nexstar Media Group and Tegna — of scheming to artificially inflate the price of ads, according to a new antitrust class action lawsuit.
Five plaintiffs who have purchased Sunday Ticket from DirecTV have filed a class action lawsuit against the NFL and its teams, as well as DirecTV, CBS, ESPN, Fox and NBC, claiming that exclusive distribution agreements have driven up the cost of pro football telecasts in violation of antitrust law.
The fourth class action lawsuit over Sunday NFL Ticket in the past two month alleges that NFL teams are colluding with each other to grant the NFL the exclusive right to market games outside each team’s home market.The TV market would be quite different if it were not for live professional football, the lawsuit says.
Rather than go to trial in a closely followed antitrust lawsuit, the National Hockey League has cut a proposed deal that would allow its fans to spend 20 percent less on a digital package to watch their favorite team. The proposed settlement comes about a month after a New York federal judge agreed to certify a class action that contends that consumers have been forced to pay too much for out-of-market NHL and Major League Baseball games — and that telecasts get blacked out for in-market games thanks to restrictive agreements with the leagues’ broadcasting partners.
The sports league joins Comcast and DirecTV in demanding an end to a lawsuit alleging a conspiracy to keep out-of-market games priced high and in-market games off of the Internet.
The Supreme Court narrowly ruled in favor of Comcast on Wednesday, holding that a group of its Philadelphia area subscribers claiming they were overcharged could not sue the cable operator in a certified class action.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit affirmed a district court’s dismissal of Sunbeam’s monopolization claim against Nielsen Media Research. All three judges on the 11th Circuit Court agreed with the lower court’s ruling that Sunbeam Television lacks antitrust standing to pursue its claims against Nielsen.
Cablevision says it has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Viacom for allegedly forcing the cable company to carry and pay for 14 lesser-watched ancillary networks. It is seeking to void its December 2012 carriage agreement
