Investing.com– The U.S. The Department of Justice plans to ask a judge to force Google owner Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) to sell off its Chrome browser as part of its antitrust probe into the tech giant, Bloomberg reported on Monday.
The department plans to ask Judge Amit Mehta of the District of Columbia, who had earlier this year ruled Google had an illegal monopoly in the search engine market, to make the ruling, Bloomberg reported.
DOJ officials also plan to ask Mehta to impose data licensing requirements on Alphabet and to address its plans for artificial intelligence and the Android operating system, the report showed.
Chrome represents a key point of focus for antitrust officials because it usually serves as a means of access for many to Google’s search. The browser is by far the most-used in the world, with data from web traffic analyst Statcounter showing Chrome with a 66.65% market share as of October 2024.
Alphabet’s shares fell as much as 1.8% in aftermarket trade following the Bloomberg report, but pared a bulk of their losses to trade down 0.5% by 18:28 ET (23:28 GMT).