US takes on Google in landmark antitrust trial

Google faces its biggest legal challenge in a Washington court on Tuesday (Sep 12), as it fends off accusations from the US government that it acted unlawfully to build its overwhelming dominance of online search.

Google faces its biggest legal challenge in a Washington court on Tuesday (Sep 12), as it fends off accusations from the US government that it acted unlawfully to build its overwhelming dominance of online search.

Over 10 weeks of testimony involving more than 100 witnesses, Google will try to persuade a federal judge that the landmark case brought by the Department of Justice is without merit.

The trial is the biggest US antitrust case against a big tech company since the same department took on Microsoft more than two decades ago over the dominance of its Windows operating system.

"Technology has progressed a lot in 20 years so what results from this case will have a strong bearing on how tech platforms operate in the future," said John Lopatka from Penn State's School of Law.