The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act aims to break up Google's ad business

A newly introduced bill could disrupt Google's supremely profitable ad process.

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With companies like Google raking in ungodly amounts of cash on a quarterly basis, there will always be concerns surrounding competitiveness and fairness in practices. The government has been closely monitoring the situation, and may soon enact a new bill that takes aim at companies like Google. The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act would change how Google carries out its ad process, forcing it to break up a key aspect of its business.

The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act was introduced this week by members of the GOP, as reported by Wall Street Journal. Among the senators involved are Mike Lee, Ted Cruz, Amy Klobuchar, and Richard Blumenthal. If the bill is enacted, it will prohibit companies that process more than $20 billion annually from digital ad business from being involved in more than one step of the digital ad business, which Google is notorious for doing.

google The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act

Mike Lee provided a statement to the Wall Street Journal about the introduction of the bill.

Lee is referring to the fact that Google not only facilitates auctions for the buying/selling of ads, it also provides the tools that parties use to buy/sell ads. The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act would force Google to pick one step of the process and abandon the other.

“Advertising tools from Google and many competitors help American websites and apps fund their content, help businesses grow, and help protect users from privacy risks and misleading ads,” said a Google spokesperson in a statement provided by CNBC. “Breaking those tools would hurt publishers and advertisers, lower ad quality, and create new privacy risks. And, at a time of heightened inflation, it would handicap small businesses looking for easy and effective ways to grow online. The real issue is low-quality data brokers who threaten Americans’ privacy and flood them with spammy ads. In short, this is the wrong bill, at the wrong time, aimed at the wrong target.”

With how massive of a force Google is in the digital ad space, it will be interesting to see how the company adapts, should The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act be passed. We’ll continue to report on the latest developments in the advertising space right here on Shacknews.

News Editor

Donovan is a young journalist from Maryland, who likes to game. His oldest gaming memory is playing Pajama Sam on his mom's desktop during weekends. Pokémon Emerald, Halo 2, and the original Star Wars Battlefront 2 were some of the most influential titles in awakening his love for video games. After interning for Shacknews throughout college, Donovan graduated from Bowie State University in 2020 with a major in broadcast journalism and joined the team full-time. He is a huge Scream nerd and film fanatic that will talk with you about movies and games all day. You can follow him on twitter @Donimals_

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