The US government formally proposed a partial breakup of Google on Wednesday, urging a federal judge to force a sale of the company’s Chrome web browser after a landmark ruling this year found that Google had violated US antitrust law with its search business.
The request by the Justice Department and a group of states opens the door to the most significant antitrust penalties for a tech giant in a generation, targeting not only Google’s illegal monopoly in search but also its growing ambitions in artificial intelligence.
If approved, the penalties could revolutionize how millions of Americans search for information and potentially disrupt the tight integration among many of Google’s key products and services. Google has promised to appeal.
The high-profile case focused on whether the tactics that made Google the default search engine in Chrome – as well as …