Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced a $700 million settlement with Google over anticompetitive practices.
According to the settlement, Google must pay $630 million in restitution—minus costs and fees—to consumers who made purchases on the Google Play Store between August 2016 and September 2023 and were harmed by Google’s anticompetitive practices.
Paxton secured the settlement alongside attorneys general from all 49 other states as well as the District of Columbia, and the territories of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
“Texas has led the nation in the fight to hold giant tech companies accountable for monopolistic activity,” said Paxton. “I am proud that this settlement brought together so many states who recognized the importance of protecting free markets.”
Google will pay the states an additional $70 million in penalties.
Additionally, the settlement requires that Google adopt better business practices to reduce its “unfair marketplace power.”
The settlement includes the following statement:
Google disputes the claims alleged in the Actions and believes it has strong defenses to these claims. The Settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing, fault, liability, or damage of any kind.
According to Paxton’s office, “The coalition of attorneys general sued Google in 2021 for unlawfully monopolizing the market of Android app distribution and in-app payment processing. Specifically, Google signed anticompetitive contracts to prevent other app stores from being preloaded on Android devices, paid key app developers not to launch products on rival app stores, and created technological barriers to deter consumers from directly downloading apps to their devices.”
