This case has been a long and tedious one for Google, but after 2 years it is finally over. Google has basically won the case. The punishment equivalence would be a slap on the wrist. This case was based on Google’s search results. Regulators wanted fair competition when it came to Google’s search results. One of the big reasons they had was that if a company was sustaining by being in the top search results on Google, and for one reason or another the site goes down in ranking, which is all automated, the business could fail from less traffic.
Google has spent well over $15 million in lobbying for this case. Google brought “The army of executives, lawyers, lobbyists, and engineers argued ‘that technology is such a fast-moving industry that regulatory burdens would hinder its evolution. In the end the 5 members of the FTC voted to close the investigation without bring charges. Google has agreed to make minor changes in how advertising is done.