In brief
- Google has filed a motion to dismiss antitrust claims from publisher Penske Media Corporation.
- The search giant argues that AI Overviews constitute product improvements, not anti-competitive conduct, claiming publishers voluntarily allow indexing and can opt out entirely.
- The motion dismisses PMC’s “reciprocal dealing” theory as simply a refusal to deal on the publisher’s preferred terms, conduct protected under Supreme Court precedent.
Google and its parent company Alphabet have filed a motion to dismiss antitrust claims from Penske Media Corporation and its subsidiaries, saying that displaying AI-generated summaries on its search engine constitutes lawful product improvement rather than anti-competitive behavior.
Filed on Monday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, this marks Google’s third attempt to kill the lawsuit after publishers amended their complaints twice following earlier dismissal motions.
Penske Media, which owns Rolling Stone, Variety, Billboard, and Deadline, sued Google last September, alleging the search giant forces publishers to surrender content for AI training and republishing as a condition of appearing in search results.
The publisher claims that Google’s AI Overviews and Featured Snippets cannibalize traffic that would otherwise flow to their websites, threatening their advertising, affiliate, and subscription revenue models.
Google’s motion systematically attacks each claim, saying that PMC “faults Google for introducing generative AI features on its search engine that more efficiently provide users with the information they seek.”
The company insists that publishers voluntarily allow Google to index their content and are able to opt out entirely.
“What the Amended Complaint calls ‘reciprocal dealing’ is nothing more than a claim that Google is refusing to deal with PMC on PMC’s preferred terms,” the filing reads, citing Supreme Court precedent that firms have “broad latitude to set the terms on which they will do business with others.”
Google contests PMC’s market definitions, calling the alleged “online publishing market,” encompassing all text-based content online, “massively overbroad and implausible.”
The company notes that competitors like Microsoft’s Bing and DuckDuckGo offer similar AI-powered search features, undercutting monopolization claims.
Google vs publishers
Google has already defeated similar claims from education company Chegg twice through dismissal motions.
The same legal team represents both plaintiffs, and Google says they’ve had “multiple opportunities to plead [their] best case” across four complaints.
“PMC’s case raises legitimate concerns about economic harm to publishers from AI integration in search, but its antitrust framework faces significant hurdles under current law,” Ishita Sharma, managing partner at Fathom Legal, told Decrypt.
If Google’s motion is granted, the case could still move forward in a “narrower form,” such as licensing or copyright claims; if it is denied, the fight may expand into “antitrust litigation at the intersection of AI and platform power,” potentially inviting broader regulatory scrutiny, she added.
Last September, a federal judge declined to force Google to divest its Chrome browser despite ruling the company unlawfully monopolized U.S. search, instead imposing conduct remedies aimed at loosening Google’s grip on search and advertising markets.
In November, a separate U.S. judge signaled urgency in the Justice Department’s ad-tech case, questioning how quickly a forced breakup of Google’s advertising business could be implemented as regulators pushed for the sale of its AdX exchange following findings that the company held illegal monopolies in key ad-tech markets.
Those cases remain under appeal or in the remedies phase, leaving Google simultaneously defending its core search business, advertising stack, and now its use of generative AI features against claims that they entrench monopoly power at publishers’ expense.
Decrypt has requested comment from Google, its legal team at WilmerHale, Penske Media Corporation, and the publishers’ attorneys at Susman Godfrey.
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