Google representative responds to Justice Department antitrust proposals

NPR's Ailsa Chang speaks with Kent Walker, Google president of global affairs and chief legal officer, about the Justice Department proposal to force Google to sell Chrome -- among other actions.

Transcript

AILSA CHANG, HOST:

The U.S. Department of Justice wants Google to sell Chrome, its popular web browser. It wants to restrict how Google promotes its own products on its own Android operating system. And it also wants Google to stop paying companies like Apple to make Google Search the default on iPhones. Those are among the remedies the Justice Department is now seeking after a federal judge ruled earlier this year that Google was abusing its monopoly power to ensure its dominance in the search engine business. Google, it is safe to say, disagrees with these proposals. It calls them, quote, "unprecedented government overreach." Joining us now is Google's President of Global Affairs and chief legal officer, Kent Walker. Welcome.

KENT WALKER: Thank you, Ailsa. It's good to be with you.

CHANG: OK, Chrome is the most widely used internet browser. If Chrome had to be a separate company, as is what's being proposed, can you just explain very briefly how would that affect people who currently use Chrome?

WALKER: Sure. Let me step back first and say that Google Search is a tool that people use every day. It reflects years of innovation. And this case was about the distribution of Google Search. But we're concerned now that these very sweeping remedies would actually impact the quality of Google Search, the people's privacy when they use it and even American technology leadership.

CHANG: Explain that bit. Why would de-linking products from the Google ecosystem jeopardize privacy? I don't get that.

WALKER: Sure. So part of the Department of Justice's requested remedies would be to have us disclose your search results to other companies. We take great pride in the security and privacy of our tools. If we're disclosing your information to domestic or foreign companies, we think that really does put Americans' privacy at risk.

CHANG: So it's safer for Americans to put all of their information with Google or most of their information with Google.

WALKER: Or at least with companies they know and trust. And they have the choice to decide which companies they want to do business with. And then to your question about Chrome, the - many of the different tools that Google has build on each other to maintain high security levels. So for example, Chrome can get signals from other parts of the Google ecosystem where we are analyzing security threats around the world and blocking malware or problematic websites and warning users.

CHANG: Well, in addition to the sale of Chrome, the Justice Department is also proposing to ban Google from paying companies like Apple to make Google the default search engine - right? - on their devices. And you wrote that that would hobble people's access to Google Search. That is something I also don't understand. Explain that.

WALKER: Sure. So the contracts at issue in the case have to do with payments to not just Apple but companies like Mozilla or Android phone manufacturers. In many cases, their businesses depend on payments from Google for search placement. So the collateral impacts of this might actually be to harm other companies in other parts of the ecosystem. And then as we look at the access implications of that, right now we are paying to make it easy for people to access our tools. If we can no longer do that, then it may well be that it's harder for Americans to find Google Search...

CHANG: How...

WALKER: ...Or other Google services.

CHANG: ...Though? If people love Google so much, they'll still make sure that Google is their default search engine. That's an easy fix for people who prefer Google.

WALKER: It can be easy if you make it easy, or it can be difficult. And we think it's appropriate and the best thing for most people to reduce the friction that they have to go through. Most people don't want to have to click through multiple screens to get to the services that they want to use in the first place.

CHANG: But Google is still powering - what? - 90% of the searches out there. So whatever friction currently exists that you describe in other parts of the world doesn't seem to be hurting Google's market dominance; does it?

WALKER: There was a lot of discussion about how much the default setting matters, and there were examples given of when Mozilla, at one point, went with a different search engine. It's right that a lot of people came back to Google because they preferred the high-quality search engine they were used to. So we would hope that most people would eventually be able to find their way back to Google. We just want to make that as easy for them as possible.

CHANG: Well, there is the argument that, because there's so little competition, that is what makes Google the best search engine right now because you are behind 90% of the searches. So you have the most data from the most users, and therefore, you can use that data to refine your search engine the most effectively. In other words, what I'm trying to say is the lack of competition has allowed Google to be the superior search technology.

WALKER: Yeah. Well, I think if you look at the facts over the last 20 years, when Google started out, it was a smaller search engine than Microsoft had or Yahoo had. We had actually had less information, but it was the superior quality of our algorithms and our innovation which allowed us to move forward. There's lots of information out there. There's lots of data out there. The key, in many cases, is not just the ingredients but the recipe you use to pull them together.

CHANG: So I understand that in December, Google will be filing its own suggestions for fixing what the judge has deemed an illegal monopoly. What are your suggestions for a more competitive environment? What should Google be doing?

WALKER: Yeah. We're still looking at that, and we'll be coming back on December 20. But the core, I think, you can look for is that we are going to come up with suggestions that are more narrowly tailored to the actual case at issue here, not as overbroad but - not things that will harm the interests of American consumers but, instead, things that will address the specific issues that were found at trial with regard to the small number of contracts.

CHANG: Can you give me a specific example of what a more narrowly tailored solution would be? Just light up my imagination. I want to picture it.

WALKER: Sure. The court talked about the notion of payment for default placements. You can imagine a variety of different ways of approaching that, and we'll be exploring that with the court in the coming weeks and months.

CHANG: Kent Walker is Google's President of Global Affairs and chief legal officer. Thank you so much for your time.

WALKER: Thank you, Ailsa. It's good to be with you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.