The US government has ordered a judge to order Google to sell its Chrome browser as part of a major antitrust crackdown.
In a court case, the US Justice Department urged Google to make its business transparent, including by restricting the tech company’s other options for being the default search engine on smartphones and preventing it from exploiting users’ Android mobile operating system.
Google should also be required to sell Android if the proposed mechanism does not prevent the tech company from using its control of the mobile operating system to its advantage, officials said in court filings.
Google’s president of global affairs, Kent Walker, responded to the filing by saying that Justice Department officials have sought to promote an interventionist agenda.
The demand to sell Google’s prized Chrome browser marks a fundamental shift by US government regulators who similarly tried to “break” Microsoft two decades ago.
