WASHINGTON (NEWSnet/AP) — Google’s dominance as an internet search engine is an illegal monopoly, U.S. Department of Justice argued Friday. Google says its ubiquity flows from its ability to deliver results customers seek.

The U.S. government, a coalition of states and Google made closing arguments Friday in the 10-week antitrust lawsuit.

U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta must decide whether Google broke the law in maintaining a monopoly status as a search engine.

The case has focused on how much Google derives strength from contracts with companies like Apple to make it the default search engine. 

Google says customers can use other search engines if they desire, but that consumers prefer Google.

During Friday’s arguments, Mehta questioned whether other companies are in the same market. He said social media companies can generate ad revenue by presenting ads that seem to match a consumer’s interest, and Google has the ability to place ads in direct response to queries.

“It’s only Google where we can see that directly declared intent,” Mehta said.

Google’s lawyer, John Schmidtlein, responded that social media companies “have lots and lots of information about your interests that I would say is just as powerful.”

Justice Department attorney David Dahlquist said during Friday’s arguments that Google was able to increase ad revenue through growth in the number of queries submitted until about 2015, when query growth slowed and the service needed to make more money on each search.

Mehta has not yet said when he will rule. If he finds that Google violated the law, he would then schedule a “remedies” phase of the trial to determine what should be done to bolster competition in the search-engine market. 

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