Too little, too late: The inadequacy of reactive antitrust enforcement in technology markets

After finding in April 2025 that Google violated antitrust law through control of the functional aspects of online advertising, Judge Leonie Brinkema recently issued her opinion as to the remedies to be imposed.

在 2025 年 4 月发现谷歌通过控制在线广告的功能方面违反了反垄断法后，法官 Leonie Brinkema 最近就应采取的补救措施发表了意见。

The Justice Department and various state attorneys general had asked that the integrated components she found central to Google’s monopolization of the ad tech market be spun off to allow for a competitive market going forward.

司法部和各州总检察长要求将她认为对谷歌垄断广告技术市场至关重要的集成组件分拆出来，以允许未来的竞争市场发展。

But Brinkema declined to order divestiture of any of those assets.

但布林克玛拒绝下令剥离任何这些资产。

Instead, she ordered a series of behavioral remedies intended to prevent continued abuse of Google’s monopoly power.

相反，她下令采取一系列行为补救措施，旨在防止谷歌的垄断权力继续被滥用。

This is the second time in little more than a year that a liability finding against Google was followed by a mild “go and sin no more” behavioral remedy.

这是一年多一点时间里第二次在针对谷歌的责任认定后采取温和的“走吧，不再犯罪”的行为补救措施。

In the earlier case, Judge Amit Mehta found that Google unlawfully monopolized online search but declined the Justice Department and state attorneys general’s request to break up the monopoly.

在早些时候的案件中，法官阿米特·梅塔（Amit Mehta）发现谷歌非法垄断在线搜索，但拒绝了司法部和州总检察长打破垄断的要求。

Despite the good faith efforts of antitrust enforcers and the courts in both cases, the outcomes in each have sparked an intense and legitimate debate over whether such relatively modest behavioral remedies will prove sufficient to create a competitive market going forward and deter future exploitative behavior by these and other dominant tech firms.

尽管反垄断执法者和法院在这两起案件中都做出了真诚的努力，但每起案件的结果都引发了一场激烈而合法的辩论，即这种相对温和的行为补救措施是否足以创造一个未来的竞争性市场，并阻止这些和其他占主导地位的科技公司未来的剥削行为。

We need to reassess whether antitrust laws written in the industrial era are up to the challenge presented by the fast-paced digital era.

我们需要重新评估工业时代制定的反垄断法是否能够应对快节奏的数字时代带来的挑战。

After-the-fact enforcement in these markets suffers from a painfully slow judicial process that aids the alleged monopolist.

这些市场的事后执法因司法程序极其缓慢而受到影响，这为所谓的垄断者提供了帮助。

This begins with how, absent early injunctive relief, monopoly abuse can continue for years before trial and a decision on the merits.

首先，如果没有早期禁令救济，垄断滥用如何在审判和就案情作出决定之前持续数年。

During that process, the technology and marketplace dominance typically controlled by the abuser speed ahead.

在此过程中，技术和市场主导地位通常由滥用者控制。

Responding to those advances, markets continue to default to the dominant position of the gatekeeper.

为了应对这些进步，市场继续默认守门人的主导地位。

By the time the matter finally reaches trial, both technology and its application have redefined reality beyond the issues being litigated, making meaningful remedies illusive.

当案件最终进入审判阶段时，技术及其应用已经重新定义了诉讼问题之外的现实，使得有意义的补救措施变得渺茫。

This problem is only compounded by the breathtaking pace of artificial intelligence (AI) development and the risk that just a few firms will come to dominate the AI stack.

人工智能 (AI) 发展的惊人速度以及少数公司将主导人工智能堆栈的风险只会使这个问题变得更加复杂。

It appears the judges in both Google cases recognized how technology had outpaced their respective courtroom debates.

谷歌两起案件的法官似乎都认识到技术如何超越了各自法庭辩论的速度。

Whether they feared judicial intrusion into the magic of digital technology or were hoping new advances would help solve the issues they were being asked to decide, we don’t know.

我们不知道他们是担心司法侵入数字技术的魔力，还是希望新的进步能够帮助解决他们被要求决定的问题。

Regardless, these decisions reinforce the need to rethink the antitrust model for modern times.

无论如何，这些决定强化了重新思考现代反垄断模式的必要性。

Since 2020, federal and state enforcers have brought four antitrust actions alleging abusive behavior by Google, Meta, and Amazon.

自 2020 年以来，联邦和州执法机构已提起四项反垄断诉讼，指控谷歌、Meta 和亚马逊的滥用行为。

Each became caught up in the time warp of technology.

每个人都陷入了技术的时间扭曲。

Google began paying Apple and others to be their exclusive default search engine as early as 2005.

早在 2005 年，谷歌就开始向苹果等公司付费，让其成为其独家默认搜索引擎。

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) investigated in 2011 but took no enforcement action.

联邦贸易委员会 (FTC) 于 2011 年进行了调查，但没有采取执法行动。

Nine years later, the Department of Justice (DOJ) and a coalition of state attorneys general filed suit .

九年后，司法部 (DOJ) 和州总检察长联盟提起诉讼。

But it took another four years for Mehta to conclude , after a lengthy trial, that “Google is a monopolist and it has acted as one [for at least 14 years] to maintain its monopoly.” The controversial behavior remedies decision took another year.

但梅塔又花了四年时间，经过漫长的审判后得出结论：“谷歌是一个垄断者，并且它（至少 14 年）一直在维持其垄断地位。”这项有争议的行为补救措施的决定又花了一年的时间。

And, of course, both Google and the antitrust enforcers are appealing , while most of the key remedial provisions are yet to be implemented .

当然，谷歌和反垄断执法机构都在上诉，而大多数关键的补救措施尚未实施。

The challenge to Google’s dominance of ad tech followed a similar path: A lawsuit filed in 2023 challenging acquisitions and conduct beginning as early as 2008 resulted in findings last year that the company had indeed engaged in conduct that “substantially harmed Google’s publisher customers, the competitive process, and, ultimately, consumers of information on the open web.” Here we are 18 years later awaiting the implementation of the judge’s behavioral remedies and, of course, the inevitable appeals.

对谷歌广告技术主导地位的挑战也遵循了类似的路径：2023 年提起的一项诉讼，对早在 2008 年就开始的收购和行为提出质疑，去年的调查结果表明，该公司确实从事“严重损害谷歌出版商客户、竞争过程，并最终损害开放网络信息消费者”的行为。 18 年后，我们在这里等待法官的行为补救措施的实施，当然还有不可避免的上诉。

The FTC’s 2020 challenge to certain Meta behaviors, especially its acquisition of would-be competitors in 2012 and 2014, also made it to trial.

FTC 2020 年对 Meta 某些行为的挑战，特别是其在 2012 年和 2014 年收购潜在竞争对手的行为，也进入了审判阶段。

Five years later, the trial judge ruled in Meta’s favor without deciding whether the company had acted badly over a decade earlier.

五年后，初审法官做出了对梅塔有利的裁决，但没有判定该公司在十多年前是否表现不佳。

He avoided that issue by concluding that the market was sufficiently different today and accordingly there was no present-day monopoly abuse for him to remedy.

他避免了这个问题，得出的结论是，今天的市场已经完全不同，因此，目前不存在需要他补救的垄断滥用行为。

The FTC’s 2023 challenge to Amazon’s alleged abuse of its online shopping dominance dating to 2011 is the one Big Tech platform case that remains unresolved, awaiting a trial next year.

FTC 于 2023 年对亚马逊涉嫌滥用其自 2011 年以来的在线购物主导地位提出质疑，这是迄今为止尚未解决的大型科技平台案件，有待明年审理。

That’s some more than 15 years before we will learn whether Amazon abused its gatekeeper status to the benefit of its shareholders and to the detriment of sellers and consumers.

大约过了 15 年，我们才会了解到亚马逊是否滥用其看门人地位，为股东谋取利益，损害卖家和消费者的利益。

Our antitrust laws are intended to deter bad behavior.

我们的反垄断法旨在阻止不良行为。

But when a company weighs the profits from extracting years—and we mean years—of monopoly overcharges against the risk that sometime down the road antitrust enforcers may investigate , may challenge the misconduct, and may prevail; a court may force a company to change its behaviors going forward, but not require divestitures; and ultimately enforcers may prevail on appeal, deterrence seems illusory at best.

但是，当一家公司权衡从多年（我们指的是多年）垄断性过高收费中获取的利润与反垄断执法者将来可能调查、质疑不当行为并可能获胜的风险时；法院可以强迫公司改变其未来的行为，但不要求资产剥离；最终执法者可能会在上诉中获胜，威慑充其量似乎是虚幻的。

In such circumstances, antitrust risk becomes a mere cost of doing business, a balance sheet line item that is dwarfed by the profits to be made while the issues are litigated.

在这种情况下，反垄断风险就变成了单纯的经营成本，是资产负债表中的一项，与问题诉讼时所获得的利润相比，显得相形见绌。

As former enforcers and believers in the value of competitive markets, we need to rethink the antitrust paradigm so that competition can thrive in technology markets, especially in the brave new world of AI.

作为竞争市场价值的前执行者和信仰者，我们需要重新思考反垄断范式，以便竞争能够在技术市场中蓬勃发展，尤其是在人工智能的美丽新世界中。

Antitrust enforcers require tools to intervene before gatekeepers can indefinitely exploit a market that has tipped in their favor.

反垄断执法者需要工具进行干预，然后守门人才能无限期地利用对他们有利的市场。

And, in the case of AI, we also need an oversight authority with the ex ante power to ensure that all benefit from a market that is robustly competitive.

而且，就人工智能而言，我们还需要一个具有事前权力的监督机构，以确保所有人都从竞争激烈的市场中受益。