A competition claim has been filed at the UK Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT), alleging anti-competitive practices against Google in the online advertising market. It is alleged that the tech giant abused its dominant position in ad tech to earn excessive profits at the expense of thousands of UK publishers.

This follows a €220 million fine against Google for anti-competitive behaviour – the claim in the UK is valued at up to £13.6 billion. Toby Starr, partner at Humphries Kerstetter which is leading the claim, said: “Google’s misconduct in this matter is well known. The French authorities have fined the firm and multiple investigations are underway across the globe. However, none of these regulatory actions will do anything to compensate the UK publishers of thousands of websites and mobile apps who have lost billions in advertising revenue because of Google’s actions. The only way to recoup these losses is through a competition class action”.

The claim is being brought on behalf of 130,000 businesses publishing around 1.75 million websites and apps in the UK. The case is operating on an opt out basis, which means that all publishers which have been impacted by Google’s practices will be considered part of the claim unless they proactively choose not to be.

A website providing further details of the claim and biographies of the key parties and individuals can be found here.