Google and antitrust: what is happening and what will change for Search and Ads?
It is rare to witness trials that can change the rules of the game. In technology, there is perhaps only one huge case, the lawsuit against Microsoft in 1998, which centered on the Internet Explorer browser. Almost twenty years later, it is Google’s turn to end up “in the dock,” because the US Department of Justice (DOJ) has been working for years to investigate allegations of antitrust violations in the United States. And, according to recent news, two different federal courts have actually found Google guilty of anti-competitive behavior in two key areas: online search and digital advertising. In short, what happens in the US affects us directly, because it concerns the entire infrastructure that regulates access to online information—search engines, user data, advertising, content ranking, artificial intelligence! Furthermore, the publication of internal documents, depositions, and ranking models has (finally) allowed us to see how the Mountain View machine really works, revealing aspects that were previously only hypothesized or intuited. So let’s open this “Pandora’s box” that those who work with visibility, traffic, and conversions cannot afford to ignore.
The DOJ case against Google: monopoly allegations for Search and Ads
Google LLC, the operating company that manages Search, Ads, Chrome, Android, and the entire ad-tech stack, has ended up in US court for alleged violations of antitrust laws. In short, the accusation is that it has consolidated its dominance in search engines and online advertising through exclusive agreements, restrictive practices, and control of entire market segments.
It all began in October 2020, when the US Department of Justice filed a federal lawsuit against Google for violating antitrust law. At the heart of the dispute was Google’s dominant position in the general search market, which, according to the lawsuit, was maintained through exclusive agreements with device and browser manufacturers. A few weeks later, a coalition of US states launched a second action, this time against Google’s advertising system, accusing the company of illegally controlling the entire digital advertising supply chain.
The two cases followed separate paths. The first, concerning Search, was heard in the Washington District Court by Judge Amit Mehta; the second, relating to the ad-tech sector, was assigned to Judge Leonie Brinkema in Virginia. Both cases came to a head between 2023 and 2024, with testimony, documentary evidence, and depositions from former employees, competitors, and analysts.
The first decisions came in 2024. In August, Judge Mehta ruled that Google had acted to maintain its monopoly in online search, violating Section 2 of the Sherman Act. In April 2025, Judge Brinkema’s ruling confirmed the illegality of the monopoly on the ad-tech market, recognizing that Google had also acted to hinder competition in the advertising tools sector through targeted acquisitions and auction manipulation.
The charges brought by the Department of Justice
The two lawsuits base their allegations on partly different elements, but linked by a common principle: the abuse of a dominant position to prevent competitors from entering or growing.
In the Google Search case, the main allegations concern:
- Exclusive agreements with device manufacturers, browsers, and telephone operators (e.g., Apple, Samsung, Mozilla) to be the default search engine.
- Billions in payments (up to $20 billion per year) to secure this position.
- Contractual practices that prevent the installation of alternative search engines or make it difficult for users to switch.
- Use of data collected through the Chrome browser to strengthen its algorithms and predictive models, making it impossible for competitors to achieve the same level of optimization.
In the ad-tech case, the DOJ challenged:
- Vertical control of the entire advertising system (ad servers, ad exchanges, demand and supply platforms), with integrated and opaque management that allows Google to act simultaneously as seller, buyer, and manager of the platform.
- The use of privileged information to manipulate auctions in its own interests.
- Strategic acquisitions of competing companies (DoubleClick, AdMeld) to eliminate competition.
The latest evidence: the Samsung-Gemini case
A further critical element emerged during these weeks, during the hearings on the Search case: Google allegedly paid “a huge sum” to Samsung to pre-install Gemini as an AI assistant within One UI, thus guaranteeing its role as the default system on millions of devices.
According to testimony from Peter Fitzgerald, Google’s vice president of platform partnerships, the agreement included monthly payments and a percentage of revenue generated from advertising displayed within the app.
The contract, with a minimum term of two years, represents an extension of the same logic already contested for Search and Android: guaranteeing exclusive visibility in exchange for financial agreements, effectively preventing the emergence of alternatives.
In short, the tactic of the past—payments to obtain predefined positions—continues to emerge even in newer sectors, such as artificial intelligence. In the view of the accusers, this agreement would have discouraged Samsung from promoting its own alternative system, consolidating Gemini as the default choice in AI as well, and limiting the possibilities for effective competition and freedom of choice for users.
What the rulings already issued say
After years of investigations and hearings, the two courts involved have already ruled on the merits, confirming the company’s unlawful use of its dominant position and pointing the finger at different areas and mechanisms.
The first verdict recognized that Google illegally maintained its monopoly in the search market. The ruling emphasized that default agreements with partners prevented other search engines—Bing, DuckDuckGo, and so on—from accessing the market, thereby compromising free competition.
In the second, more recent case, Judge Brinkema ruled that Google had also built and defended a monopoly in the advertising sector, particularly in the ad exchange (AdX) and ad server (DFP) markets. According to the court, the company manipulated the system in its favor, harming publishers, advertisers, and end users and maintaining profit margins higher than those achievable in a competitive market.
In both cases, the Department of Justice (DOJ) emphasized that these practices reduced the variety of options available to users, increased costs for advertisers, and stifled innovation in the industry. Above all, it demonstrated that Google’s dominance was not based on mere technological superiority, but on a system structured to prevent the emergence of credible alternatives.
Does it end there? The local front and the lawsuit filed by Yelp
On August 29, 2024, Yelp filed a lawsuit against Google for abuse of its dominant position in local search. According to the company, which has historically been active in the field of local reviews, Google has built an unfair advantage by promoting its own results, penalizing those of its competitors, and degrading the overall quality of the user experience.
In its blog and legal documents, Yelp accuses Google of “illegal self-preferencing” and of making it more difficult for competing verticals to access its information boxes. Google’s local results, Yelp explains, are dominated by poor or incomplete content (e.g., stars without text), while its own results are filtered and downgraded.
The decision to file the lawsuit came after Google’s conviction in the DOJ trial because, as CEO Jeremy Stoppelman stated, “the rulings already handed down have shown that the ground has changed. Now we can act.”
Google responded by referring to previous rejections by the FTC and the antitrust court itself, calling the allegations “already rejected” and “baseless.” Nevertheless, and even though the case is only just beginning, a message is emerging from many quarters: the current structure of Search could be called into question not only by regulators, but also by vertical players determined to no longer accept a marginal role. These are no longer isolated battles: it is a counterattack strategy, and those who are moving now are doing so with a new legitimacy.
A process that affects the entire digital economy
“DOJ vs Google” is not just about Google as a company, but about the entire digital ecosystem in which we operate every day. Those who work in the world of SEO, digital advertising, lead generation, or content marketing know how fundamental search engine dynamics are to achieving visibility and results—and even today, organic traffic from Google is one of the main sources of visits to websites.
The allegations against Google, the defenses presented in court, the information leaked, and the measures currently under consideration are likely to profoundly change the way the entire search industry works—and with it, all related digital strategies.
The two decisions against Google LLC found anti-competitive practices in both online search management and the advertising supply chain. From a legal standpoint, these are first instance rulings in the federal system, valid and binding, but not yet final, as the company can appeal.
What happens from now on will make the difference: determining whether and how to intervene in the mechanisms that produced the illegitimate advantage. Spin-offs, licenses, technical obligations, or contractual prohibitions: each hypothesis brings with it a different idea of competition, economic freedom, and control over digital infrastructure.
The effects and possible countermeasures
We are now in the next phase, where the discussion is no longer just about responsibility, but about how to intervene to bring about concrete changes in the market structure. The US authorities have put forward structural proposals that will affect the technical and commercial organization of Google’s core services. The company has responded with firm opposition, proposing behavioral remedies instead.
The gap between the two visions is clear. On the one hand, there is the intention to remove the conditions that have allowed abuse, and on the other, the attempt to limit changes to less invasive solutions.
Specifically, the US government’s demands include measures that would directly affect the technical and commercial architecture of Google’s key products, such as:
- Splitting up the Chrome browser. The goal would be to break the link between browsing, data collection, and algorithmic optimization. The DOJ believes that the integration between the browser and search engine has given Google an unfair advantage.
- Requiring search indexes to be accessible via API. This would allow other operators to build competing engines from a common base, reducing Google’s information advantage.
- Compulsory licensing of advertising feeds. Google could be forced to make market information that it currently manages exclusively (e.g., auction data, performance data, segment data) available to third parties.
- Prohibition on entering into exclusive agreements. This applies in particular to pre-installation on devices, but also to artificial intelligence products (such as Gemini) integrated into operating systems.
According to the Department of Justice, without such measures, Google could continue to exercise the same control, albeit in a more cautious or indirect form. The proposed remedies would therefore serve to structurally change the competitive environment, not just correct past behavior.
The government’s requests for technical interventions: data, AI, and content control
In addition to proposals for structural divestitures, the Department of Justice has put forward a series of measures aimed at neutralizing Google’s information and distribution advantages without directly affecting platform ownership.
The initial idea of also requiring the sale of Android has been scaled back: the company will be able to retain control, but will have to implement structural and contractual changes to separate the promotion of its search and AI services from the operating system’s functionality. Only in the event of non-compliance or ineffectiveness would the sale be reconsidered.
Still on the table is the request that Google make its search indexes, ranking factors, and advertising feeds accessible via API, particularly on mobile. This would also include models, data, and systems used to generate results and automatic responses, including the content managed through artificial intelligence.
This is a measure that would directly affect the effectiveness of Google’s closed systems, leveling the playing field—at least in theory—for other search engines and service providers. Equally significant is the proposal to introduce a right to opt out of AI systems: publishers could prevent their content from being used in model training and in the automatic generation of summaries and responses in SERPs (such as AI Overview).
This is an issue that has already been raised in public debate, but here it enters as a possible legal obligation, with potentially enormous impacts on the quality and quantity of data available for generative models.
Finally, the DOJ has provided for the possibility of educational and informational interventions for users, with the aim of making it clearer that they can choose other search engines and tools. This is a form of “active competition” that involves awareness, not just access.
Google’s alternative proposals
Quite predictably, Google contests both the legitimacy and proportionality of the proposed measures. In various briefs and public statements, the company has argued that:
- The proposed measures would jeopardize user privacy by forcing users to share sensitive data with less secure competitors.
- The requirement to open indexes could compromise the quality of search results and harm the user experience.
- The separation of products such as Chrome or Ad Manager would create technical complexity and efficiency losses, with negative impacts also for publishing and advertising partners.
Google has put forward proposals for behavioral remedies, such as the adoption of new transparency standards, opt-out tools, and independent audit mechanisms. However, according to the US authorities, these solutions would be insufficient to truly rebalance the market, as they would leave intact the competitive advantage built up over time.
What the internal documents reveal
The courts have ruled that Google has broken the law. But what strikes us, as outside observers but also as parties involved in some way as digital operators, is the evidence gathered—testimony, confidential documents, internal emails, GitHub filings—which shows in detail the mechanisms that made this dominance possible. Beyond the rulings, this is the part that really affects those who work with online visibility: not because it reveals secrets, but because it officially confirms how rankings are generated, which signals really matter, how predictive models are built, and where user behavior comes into play.
These are no longer forum hypotheses or unverified theories. What emerges from the files is a system built to learn, adapt, reward permanence, and discourage misalignment. With a granularity and control that go beyond the simple relevance between a page and a query.
The real signals that influence ranking
Until now, the structure of Google’s algorithm has been the subject of speculation, empirical observations, and more or less reliable reverse engineering. With the ongoing process and the accidental publication of the Content Warehouse API, these hypotheses are being confirmed—and in some cases disproved. A much more complex, dynamic, and interactive model is emerging than what Google has officially communicated over the years.
Just to recap the context of the Google leak in May 2024, we are talking about an internal archive containing over 14,000 attributes and signals used in Google’s systems, which represented one of the moments of greatest clarity about the real workings of Search.
In particular, the files seem to confirm:
- The existence and active role of Navboost, a system that stores user clicks for each query, location, and device, and builds a behavioral relevance map. Navboost maintains a 13-month history: every click (and every missed click) contributes to determining the perceived relevance of a result.
- The use of RankEmbed, vector signals that relate similar content based on historical behavior and user interactions.
- The influence of Q* (document quality) and T* (topical consistency), static quality and topicality scores assigned to documents, which also have a cross-cutting impact on SERPs and can intervene upstream of traditional ranking, modifying it based on pre-processed evaluations by supervised machine learning models.
- The presence of signals labeled as badClicks (clicks considered unsatisfactory), lastLongestClicks (the last click with a long time), unsquashedImpressions (views not “suppressed”), behavioral metrics that Google has publicly denied using, but which are active in the system.
- The continued use of PageRank, but in an evolved form, which includes “semantic proximity” metrics (site radius, siteFocusScore) between domains and content.
The logic of the system: learning from behavior
In short: the leak and court documents have shown that Google uses signals such as Navboost, Glue, and scrollDepth to evaluate user interaction—signals recognized internally as part of the system but never publicly confirmed as ranking components.
During the hearings, Pandu Nayak (VP of Search, at Google since 2004) explained that user behavior — including clicks, scrolls, and sessions — contributes to improving the quality of responses, but is not the only relevant factor. He referred to a multi-level signal framework, where interaction is a significant element, but integrated with structural, semantic, and content quality assessments. An article on Search Engine Land explains how the “three pillars of ranking” emerge from these court documents: body text, links, and user interactions — the latter defined as “…clicks, attention, swipes, entering new queries.”
This confirms that Google actively monitors user behavior, but does so within a more complex framework of signals that include static algorithms, machine learning, and quality metrics. There are very advanced and granular metrics and tools in Google’s internal systems that are not passively observational but actively influence the structure of the SERP and are used to refine the ranking of results in real time.
The role of Chrome in data collection
The means by which Google has set up the ‘system’ described above is Chrome: for the Department of Justice, it is not (and has not been) just a browser, but a potential privileged channel for collecting behavioral signals, the practical hub for collecting and processing user data, which is used (and is fundamental) to feed and refine ranking and advertising systems.
Google’s materials—in particular, the internal presentation “Life of a Click”—state that user signals include “clicks, attention to a result, swipes on carousels, and new queries”; in short, the interactions recorded are much more complex than simple clicks and could also include signals such as time spent on a page, scroll rate, clicks on menu items, and even mouse movements, which are stored, aggregated, and used to correct or confirm the order of results in SERPs.
The central point of the case theory according to the DOJ is that this data does not come directly from Search, but from the browser. Chrome allows Google to collect in-depth behavioral signals that other operators do not have access to. This advantage cannot be replicated by competitors, both because they do not have an equivalent tool and because they are subject to more stringent regulatory constraints. It is precisely this information asymmetry that the accusation focuses on: Google can train and optimize its models on a significantly larger database than any other player. This is the rationale behind the request to unbundle Chrome, which does not only concern the browser itself, but its central role in the access network and behavioral know-how.
Furthermore, the integration between Chrome and other Google services can create a feedback network that extends far beyond search behavior. Interactions on YouTube, Gmail, Maps, Google Docs, and other products help define the user’s profile and, in some cases, could influence ranking and advertising targeting dynamics.
It is therefore not a question of privacy or branding, but of balancing information power in an attempt to reduce the concentration of signals in a single system under exclusive and persistent control.
What does this mean for us? The impact on the work of those in the digital sector
Why does a competitor’s page rise for no apparent reason? Why does an ad cost twice as much from one month to the next? Why does visibility plummet, even with updated content and solid links?
Questions like these have been asked for years by those working on search, content, and campaigns. The answers we were able to give were always hypothetical, based on tests, deductions, and partial statements. Or we relied on reassurances from Google’s public voices—when they weren’t hiding behind a laconic “it depends.”
Now the context has changed.
We have official documents, testimonies, and technical documentation that—as revealed in the antitrust trial—call the dominant narrative into question.
The opacity does not seem to be accidental. Hidden signals exist. Some advertising dynamics have been designed to generate systemic advantages. These are no longer just marginal theories or forum suspicions: according to the prosecution – and in part also according to the documents examined – the entire Google ecosystem may have been designed to favor behavior that is useful to the company, even at the expense of competition.
If confirmed, this changes everything. It changes the way we analyze fluctuations in rankings, design content, and manage auctions. It also changes the trust we place in automatisms, tools, and “best practices” that, as we now know, may be based on logic that has never been openly declared. What can we still consider “neutral” in the functioning of Google?
Should we question what we know about SEO?
SEO practitioners have always had to think hypothetically, especially after every core algorithm update, which is followed by an attempt to decipher it through cross-testing and contradictory signals.
The DOJ vs. Google case, however, in some ways confirms that ranking is not based solely on relevance and perceived quality, but on a combination of static and behavioral signals, which are not “neutral” scores because they directly affect the order of results. Added to these are behavioral reinforcement mechanisms.
This changes the perspective: it is not enough to be relevant, you have to become preferable. All content is found within a memory network, where user interaction—even if not clicked—can determine its fate.
SEO strategy must take this into account: intercepting intent is the starting point, because the goal is to generate a response that triggers positive signals. Each page generates a “social response” consisting of clicks, time, scrolls, returns, and further exploration. In this sense, it becomes even more important to “write for the user” as well as for the algorithms, with greater awareness of which signals matter and how they settle over time.
The implications for ads: the advertising system in a new light
The revelations that emerged in court confirmed the suspicion that something is happening “behind the scenes” at Google Ads and that not everything is transparent, particularly with rising costs, unpredictable results, and automated processes that cannot always be explained by “standard” logic. Jerry Dischler, former Vice President of Google Ads, admitted that Google used “auction tuning knobs” — tools to fine-tune advertising auctions — with the aim of maximizing revenue, even without informing advertisers. According to analysts at Bloomberg, these uncommunicated adjustments have caused an average price increase of up to 5%, with a possible impact of up to 10% on advertiser costs. Dischler actually said explicitly: “We tend not to tell advertisers about pricing changes.”
These admissions undermine the idea that Google Ads is a system based solely on transparent metrics such as CPC or ad quality. On the contrary, they show a level of control that can alter the competitiveness and returns of campaigns, benefiting those who know how to interpret the dynamics and at the expense of those who do not have access to the same information.
In terms of antitrust law, this practice reinforces the DOJ’s argument: Google has a monopoly in advertising search because it can raise prices without losing advertisers, a clear sign that it occupies a dominant position with little competitive risk.
For those who invest in Google Ads, this is a paradigm shift: it is not enough to plan a strategy, it is also necessary to analyze the internal workings of the system. Pending regulatory intervention—such as the request to open feeds or limits on automation—the risk of imbalances and unexpected costs remains high.
Google’s version of events
It could not remain silent. After weeks of testimony, documents, and internal reconstructions, Google has also taken a stand. It did so partly in court, through its legal representatives, and partly outside the courtroom, with press releases, official posts, and statements to the press. The tone was firm and predictable: the company rejects the allegations, disputes the interpretation of the data, and raises doubts about the compatibility of the proposed remedies with the very functioning of the web.
No admissions, no backtracking. But then again, it would be difficult to expect anything else. After years of claiming that the quality of its results is the sole reason for its success and downplaying the influence of its commercial choices, a change in narrative would be impossible without undermining its entire reputation. So Google responds, defends itself, and raises the stakes—while staying within the lines it has already drawn.
Fundamentally, the company denies any manipulative intent, defends the effectiveness of its product, and contests the Justice Department’s view. Every accusation is relativized, every proposed remedy presented as disproportionate or counterproductive. It is a predictable, necessary, perhaps inevitable line. But now that certain dynamics have been confirmed by official documents and internal testimony, that narrative sounds different. Not wrong, but disconnected from a reality that has emerged too strongly to be ignored.
The company’s official statements
The most detailed response came at the end of the hearings, with a statement published on Google’s official blog in November 2024. The post—signed by Kent Walker, President of Global Affairs—challenges the accusatory framework on several fronts: first, it argues that the spread of its search engine is the result of free choices made by users. Agreements with manufacturers and distributors—which guarantee the pre-installation and default setting of Google as the search engine—are described as legitimate commercial practices, widespread throughout the technology sector; more precisely, it says that “browsers choose Google because it offers the best service, not because of any obligations imposed.”
The company also denies that it has restricted competition: on the contrary, it points to the emergence of platforms such as TikTok, Amazon, Instagram, Reddit, and ChatGPT as evidence of a dynamic and open market where users can access multiple sources and tools to search for information.
But it is on the measures proposed by the government that the tone becomes more pointed. Walker describes the DOJ’s demands—including opening up the search index or spinning off Chrome—as “radical,” “unprecedented,” and ‘disproportionate’ to the allegations made. According to Google, such interventions “would compromise user privacy and security, increase costs for businesses, and harm the overall search experience.”
In other passages, Walker reiterates the concept: “This extreme proposal would put the security and privacy of millions of Americans at risk.” The message is consistent with the defense line maintained in court and in the media: Google presents itself not as a dominant player to be scaled back, but as the guarantor of a digital ecosystem that — in its view — works, innovates, and responds to users’ needs.
Sundar Pichai, who spoke in court during the remedies phase (April 2025), also criticized the DOJ’s proposed approach, which would be an effective strategic separation (“de facto divestiture”) of the search engine, capable of undermining investment in research and development. Pichai warned: “It would be trivial to reverse engineer and effectively build Google Search from the outside. It’s not clear to me how we would fund all the innovation… if we had to give it all away at marginal cost.” In other words: “It would be trivial to rebuild Google Search from the outside. It is not clear how we could finance innovation… if we had to share everything at marginal cost.” In the same context, Pichai described the proposed measures as “so far-reaching, so extraordinary,” highlighting his concern about the disruption they could cause in the course of technological development.
Does artificial intelligence defend the brand?
A curious but far from insignificant passage concerns AI Overview, the new generative system integrated directly into Google’s SERP. What does Google’s AI respond when asked to explain the antitrust process involving… Google?
In a test carried out a few days ago, the Overview provided a formally correct but decidedly cautious summary of the facts. The DOJ’s allegations are mentioned, but always accompanied by words such as ‘claims’, ‘believes’, and ‘accuses’. Verdicts already handed down are not clearly identified as such. The proposed measures are described without detail. There is never a sentence that questions Google’s role, nor is there any direct reference to internal data that emerged in court.
It almost seems as if the system is following the same communication strategy as its parent company: minimise impact, remain vague on the merits, maintain a neutral tone even in the face of proven facts. We are a long way from ‘censorship’, but the difference between Google’s voice and that of its AI is subtle. And who knows if it is accidental.
What lies ahead? Gattopardo or Bastille?
The rulings can be appealed, the sanctions postponed, the measures modified along the way. But one thing is certain: something has cracked. After years of undisputed supremacy, Google finds itself in a position of public vulnerability for the first time. And the industry has begun to adapt, regardless of the formal outcome of the dispute.
Some signs are already visible.
Apple, for example, has stepped up its investment in an alternative search system, and several publications (including Bloomberg) report that an “Apple Search” engine may already be operational on Safari in a hybrid form, with generative components. Meta has also reactivated internal search projects, this time integrated into AI models. At the same time, Microsoft has gained further visibility thanks to the integration of Bing into Copilot, seeking to distance itself from the rhetoric of “fictitious” competition.
Meanwhile, marketing professionals are already recalibrating their strategies. More is being invested in multichannel tools, long-form content that generates real interactions, and formats that survive the volatility of SERPs. This is not just a reaction to the process: it is an awareness that user behavior—real or perceived—is as important as on-page optimization.
Uncertainty remains, however. While there are calls for more transparency, there are fears that excessive openness will make search manipulable. If Google were forced to open its indexes or make its ranking signals public, it would open up a whole new field. New platforms could emerge, but so could new aggressive strategies to “break” the models.
The breaking point has already been passed. It is not a question of whether the system will change, but how and with what consequences. The US authorities have put radical measures on the table: corrective measures, break-ups, compulsory licenses, new transparency requirements, and limits on integration between services. The process is still ongoing, but some directions already seem to have been set.
Will it be a digital Gattopardo—a few tweaks to the surface, new rules with no real impact on the underlying mechanisms? Or will we move towards a contemporary Bastille, with a reversal of the balance of power and a market that is finally contestable, even in sectors that have been dominated until now?
No other engine, no other player has ever had access to Google’s index, to behavioral data on the scale of billions of users, to the network of cross-feedback between browsers, search, AI, and advertising. Breaking this mechanism would mean reopening space for competition, but also creating technical friction, new complexities, and regulatory uncertainty that would be difficult to manage.
What we can predict is that change—whether partial or systemic—will not be painless. Companies will have to contend with new dynamics, perhaps new players, and certainly new constraints. Google will be able to appeal, slow down the process, and negotiate terms, but the ground is shifting, and those working in digital can no longer afford to ignore it. The metrics will change. Ranking logic may become more exposed, but also more demanding. The advertising landscape could fragment, opening up new platforms but with less integration and less control. Google’s “centrality” — hitherto taken for granted — could become a choice, no longer an automatic condition.
Preparing now is not a tactical choice. It is an act of strategic clarity. For those involved in SEO, SEM, and digital marketing, the margin for action is not disappearing: it is shifting. We need to be ready for an environment where the rules are no longer just those of a closed algorithm, but those of a system under public debate. And this is something completely new.
Possible upheavals in the SEO approach
Let’s start with what we know best. Google will not change the way its algorithm works overnight, but some of the proposals under discussion aim to make indexes, signals, and ranking models accessible: if this were to happen, the level of transparency in the search field would be unprecedented.
Such an opening, which is only hypothetical at present, would bring advantages but also operational risks. On the one hand, it would allow us to better understand the dynamics of SERPs, going beyond empirical deductions. On the other hand, it could lead to extreme standardization of SEO practices, in which competition would be based entirely on the interpretation of declared signals and less on the actual quality of content.
In short: SEO specialists would have more accurate analysis tools than those available today, which are less predictive, but the flip side is that if everything becomes visible, everything becomes more competitive. The same optimization techniques could become more standardized, and the effectiveness of many approaches would decrease.
Added to this is the issue of exclusion from AI systems: if publishers can choose not to be used for model training or for automatic responses in SERPs, every site will have to ask itself strategic questions. Should they accept greater exposure and the risk of “paraphrasing” in AI Overview, or withdraw from the circuit and give up some of their visibility?
On the other hand, Google’s reaction will not be passive: the company has the technical, commercial, and contractual strength to adapt its platforms to new constraints while maintaining its scale and data advantage. It cannot be ruled out that, even in a restructured scenario, dominance will be rebuilt on new foundations. Lock-in dynamics are more resistant than is often imagined.
One thing seems clear, however: the relationship between content and search engines is changing. And visibility will no longer be just a matter of optimization.
Possible unknowns for those investing in Ads
No less revolutionary are the implications for advertising, especially after admissions and internal documents relating to auction behavior—although still subject to litigation—have confirmed suspicions that not everything in the Google Ads system is predictable or explainable by the available metrics, and that auctions are not a neutral mechanism, because in some cases Google has “adjusted” the dynamics to increase revenues, artificially pushing up costs for certain segments.
Models such as LTV and LEM could continue to function in the background even after regulatory intervention, but if the system were restructured (with the spin-off of Ad Manager or the opening of advertising feeds), the balance could change substantially.
Those working on campaigns should start considering:
- new acquisition channels and emerging platforms to reduce dependence on a single ecosystem;
- closely monitoring costs and performance variations, even on micro-segments;
- strategically repositioning promoted content in anticipation of a possible change in premium placement management.
If the countermeasures proposed by the DOJ are adopted—for example, with the opening of advertising feeds or the spin-off of part of the ad-tech stack—the functioning of auctions could become more accessible and controllable. But until that happens, investors must operate in a still opaque environment, where automatic optimizations do not always work in the advertiser’s favor.
The risk is not only economic, but also strategic: delegating everything to automation without understanding the underlying logic exposes you to unexpected variations, unjustified costs, and a gradual loss of control over performance.
Strategies to monitor in digital marketing
In this uncertain scenario, the only mistake you can make is to wait and see. Those working in marketing—at all levels—will need to refocus their attention on the tools, metrics, and logic they use to measure performance and plan spending.
Actions to consider include:
- Diversify channels, not because it’s trendy, but to reduce operational risk.
- Review advertising automation: not all of it will work in the same way if auction rules or control over platforms change.
- Recalibrate SEO analysis: if signals change or become public, competitive advantage will shift from “intuition” to “data reading.”
- Reassess data ownership: those who own their own information (first-party data) will be in a much stronger position in any new equilibrium.
At the same time, it is important to observe how Google’s competitors will move: Apple, Amazon, OpenAI, TikTok, even Samsung — every player could take advantage of a moment of uncertainty to advance, specialize, and build new dependencies.
Change—if and when it comes—will not only be a risk: it could mean more plurality in search, more alternative tools, and more visibility for those who have been penalized by opaque logic until now.
But to turn instability into opportunity, we need to be prepared. With flexible analysis models, data-driven strategies, and the ability to react quickly to developments. At this stage, monitoring is no longer enough: interpretation is needed.
If, until yesterday, everything was opaque and Google dictated the rules everywhere, unchallenged, now the scenario could open up: there are actions, rulings, data, and—perhaps—room for transformation. But between Gattopardo and Bastille, one does not choose by will—it is an inevitably political, economic, and strategic question.
And it concerns everyone. Even those who have not yet noticed.
