Google says open web is in rapid decline in remedies filing

Google has acknowledged in a recent court filing that the "open web is already in rapid decline," even as it won a narrower-than-expected victory this month in a separate antitrust case that spared it the divestiture of Chrome and Android. The admission surfaced in litigation over Google's advertising technology and comes amid new private suits by ad exchanges and mounting concern among publishers over falling referral traffic from search and growing use of AI summaries.

In its filing responding to remedies sought by the U.S. Department of Justice, Google argued that market forces including generative AI, connected television and retail media are reshaping digital advertising, and that forcing a breakup of its ad business would "only accelerate that decline, harming publishers who currently rely on open-web display advertising revenue," the company wrote in the court document. The same filing said plaintiffs were seeking solutions as if "the incredibly dynamic ad tech ecosystem had stood still."

That statement appears at odds with public comments from Google executives in recent months. CEO Sundar Pichai and other senior leaders have publicly defended Search as healthy and said...