Google denies destroying ‘chat’ evidence in US antitrust court | – #Google #denies #destroying #chat #evidence #antitrust #court
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20 March (Reuters) – Alphabet Inc’s ( GOOGL.O Google company in response to the government’s proposed sanctions in federal court USA Denied willful destruction of evidence in Justice Department antitrust lawsuit over company’s search business.
Last month, the Justice Department claimed that Google failed to protect certain internal corporate “chat” communications. The DOJ said that Google in 2019 USA told investigators that the company had stopped allowing automatic deletion of these instant messaging records.
Google said in a statement on Friday that the company takes “reasonable” efforts to protect its communications records.
The proposed sanctions came from the DOJ and a group of more than 30 states that accused Google of using an illegal exemption to maintain its dominance in the search business. court claims. Google has denied the allegations. 2020The case opened in 2008 is expected to be brought to court in September.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice declined to comment on Monday. Google lawyers and a representative for the company did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
Department of Justice USAasked District Judge Amit Mehta to schedule a sanctions hearing, but court has not scheduled a meeting yet.
Mehta last year rejected the Justice Department’s proposed sanctions against Google because it protects the review of too many documents.
In its latest proposal for sanctions, the DOJ said that Google’s “daily destruction of written records in the U.S. has caused Google executives, including alleged court has harmed the United States by depriving the United States of a rich source of candid discussion among its witnesses,” he claimed.
Google’s lawyers called it “unfair” to claim the company took steps to deprive plaintiffs of information. Google said it had already released millions of documents and “vast amounts of data” as part of the lawsuit.
The case is United States v. Google LLC, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, No. 1:20-cv-03010-APM.
Reporting by Mike Scarcella; Edited by Leigh Jones and Richard Chang
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2023-03-20 21:19:34
Source – reuters
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