Hedar: Businesses should recover their losses from Google’s conduct
A retired deputy High Court judge is set to front a collective action worth billions of pounds alleging that Google has abused its dominant position in online search advertising.
Roger Kaye KC’s claim will be the latest in a series of cases brought in the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) against Google and its parent, Alphabet, over abuse of a dominant position.
However, his lawyers, specialist collective redress law firm KP Law, said this would be the first on behalf of this particular group of affected businesses.
Mr Kaye, who practises as a mediator and arbitrator from Enterprise Chambers, alleges that thousands of businesses and other commercial entities have had to pay more for search advertising than they should have done as a result of Google’s unlawful conduct.
KP Law said it expected to file an application for an opt-out collective proceedings order before Christmas. Consulting firm Keystone Strategy is among those supporting the claim, which KP said was fully funded. More details will be provided when the application is filed.
Duncan Hedar, head of KP Law’s competition department, said: “Google’s conduct in the search advertising market has been found to be abusive by both the European Commission and more recently by a US court in proceedings brought by the US Department of Justice.
“Mr Kaye’s case is that businesses have overpaid for services offered by Google as a result of that abusive conduct and it’s only right that they be able to recover those losses. It is important that competition law continues to protect the rights of businesses and doesn’t allow monopoly power to create a very unlevel playing field.”
KP Law was created earlier this year through the merger of Keller Postman UK and Lanier Longstaff Hedar & Roberts, and has offices in London, Liverpool, Birmingham and Manchester.
It was also in the news last week over a planned claim against Johnson & Johnson over claims that extended use of talcum powder caused an increased risk of various types of cancer.
KP remains connected to The Lanier Law Firm in the US, headed by leading US trial lawyer Mark Lanier, who has had success in the US with talcum powder cases.
Meanwhile, the CAT has certified the £7bn collective action against Google brought by Nikki Stopford, a consumer rights campaigner, that accuses it of exploiting its dominance in the search market to increase advertising costs, which were ultimately passed on to consumers.
The class is all UK-domiciled consumers aged 16 years or over who, between 1 January 2011 and 7 September 2023 (inclusive), purchased goods and/or services from a business selling in the UK that used search advertising services provided by Google.
The current estimate is that compensation is likely to be around £100 per person.
Ms Stopford, co-founder of Consumer Voice, said: “This green light from the tribunal is a significant victory for UK consumers. Almost everybody uses Google as their go-to search engine, trusting it to deliver quality results at no cost. But its service isn’t genuinely free because its dominance has resulted in increased costs for consumers.
“Google has been warned repeatedly by competition regulators. Yet it continues to rig the market to charge advertisers more, which raises the prices they charge consumers.”
Her solicitor, Luke Streatfeild, a partner at Hausfeld & Co, added: “The judgment is also helpful in clarifying the standard for assessing exclusionary conduct by dominant companies, in particular in digital markets with high barriers to entry, and it will be a useful reference point in future cases that aim to promote fairer competition and better outcomes for consumers in those marketplaces.”
Finally, Manchester firm Barings Law has started onboarding clients for a “probable” class action against Google and Microsoft on the basis that they are unlawfully collecting and using people’s data to train artificial intelligence.
It has launched a marketing campaign targeting anyone with a Microsoft or Google account or who have used their services with a view to launching proceedings “at the beginning of 2025”.
Barings Law’s head of data breach, Adnan Malik, said: “This case is the Everest of data collection, but we are ready to fight for the right of secure privacy for Microsoft and Google users throughout the UK…
“Both companies are collecting data such as the sports teams you follow, the programming languages you prefer, the stocks you track, your local weather or traffic, the route you take to work and what your voice sounds like.”
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