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A Kansas landscaping company is leading the charge in the latest class action lawsuit arguing major internet companies are choking the competition over digital ad space with unfair monopolies over the systems that serve them.
Facebook, Google and Amazon are all listed as defendants in the lawsuit.
The owners of Cliffy Care Landscaping allege the tech giants are working together to game the digital marketing system, squashing competition, violating federal antitrust laws.
“Defendants conspired to allocate to one another the advertisers and publishers affiliated with each network and to eliminate competition between them in the open display advertising market,” the class action lawsuit said.
Spending on digital advertising has allegedly eclipsed all forms of traditional media.
In the past decade or so, tech giants like Google and Facebook have worked to dominate the digital advertising market, the plaintiffs allege.
Google, for example, has worked since 2008 to allegedly develop and build its advertising network through a series of acquisitions. This resulted in the internet giant often ending up on both sides of an ad space transaction.
“It is unusual, to say the least, for a single company to represent both sellers and buyers in the same market, and to set the rules for, and conduct, the auctions that determine the winners, losers, and prices in that market,” the class action lawsuit asserts.
This build-up of digital ad capacity led to lawsuits filed by 10 state attorneys general and the U.S. Dept. of Justice last year.
Texas, Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Utah all joined in a complaint filed in December claiming Google violates antitrust laws.
In one particular scheme called “Jedi Blue,” Google and Facebook colluded to use each other’s digital ad networks instead of competing directly with other exchanges, the lawsuit asserts. This led to Facebook getting preferred bids and a “guaranteed win rate.”
Plaintiffs contend the everyday marketer is dwarfed by Google and Facebook’s “superior information” about every aspect to online advertising.
Experts predict spending on digital and online ads in 2021 will top $129 billion, Cliffy Care Landscaping says. Some two-thirds is expected to be spent on search advertising alone.
Google captures about 88 percent of all searches done in the U.S., the plaintiffs allege. Worldwide, some 92 percent of internet users use Google to search.
This reality means businesses or individuals looking to promote their product or service has to go through Google, Facebook or Amazon to be seen, according to the class action lawsuit.
The plaintiffs argue Facebook, Google and Amazon control about 79 percent of the internet’s non-search digital ads.
The networks these tech companies use “should vigorously compete for advertisers and publishers, but they do not,” the lawsuit says.
Do you use Facebook, Google or Amazon to advertise? What do you think of this class action lawsuit’s claims? Let us know in the comment section below.
Counsel representing the plaintiffs in this class action lawsuit are Jonathan L. Rubin, Daniel J. Mogin, Jennifer M. Oliver, Timothy Z. LaComb of Moginrubin LLP; Richard F. Lombardo and Peter F. Rottgers of Shaffer Lombardo Shurin.
The Facebook Google Amazon Digital Ads Class Action Lawsuit is Cliffy Care Landscaping LLC, et al. v. Facebook, Inc., Case No. 1:21-cv-00360, in the U.S. District Court for the District Of Columbia.
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