This week, the Google Ad tech trial begins its remedies phase. The Department of Justice unveiled its proposed remedies in the ad tech case against Google earlier this month. 

The DOJ’s plan doesn’t stop at conduct limits: It pushes for structural breakup by forcing the divestiture of Google’s ad exchange (AdX) and, in phases, its publisher ad server (DoubleClick for Publishers, now part of Google Ad Manager). Among other measures, it proposes open-sourcing the code that runs the final publisher auction, requires sharing DoubleClick for Publishers (DFP) data with an industry body that would host that open-source auction, and restricts how Google can use certain first-party data.

Just like Judge Mehta recognized in his Google Search remedies trial ruling earlier this month, digital markets are rapidly evolving in part due to healthy competition. The DOJ’s proposed sprawling redesign of this market through overreaching remedies that compel divestitures and broad code and data disclosures risk undercutting innovation, publishers, small businesses, and consumers.

Divesting AdX and DFP Will Harm Publishers and Small Businesses

Google’s ad technology has long provided publishers and small advertisers with turnkey access to demand. Executives across the supply chain warn that forcing a migration away from DoubleClick for Publishers (DFP) could result in missed payouts, higher operating costs, and prolonged switchover headaches. An executive at Black Enterprise, an American multimedia company, highlighted that publishers would lose access to a free ad server and would therefore pay for access to either Google’s ad server or another third-party ad server, which could result in per-CPM platform fees—ranging from $0.25 to $2—on every video impression.

This is why antitrust scholars also urge caution with breakups in innovative markets. Antitrust expert Herbert Hovenkamp warned that structural relief in fast-growing digital markets is hazardous at best because evidence that a breakup will increase output, lower prices, or spur innovation is especially hard to establish.

— Groups representing American innovation and business echo that principle. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce puts it plainly that “antitrust remedies must be narrowly tailored to the violation found and should not micromanage markets.”

Forced IP Transfer and Data Disclosure Risk Endangering Privacy and Security for Consumers and Small Businesses

The DOJ would require Google to separate and open-source the code that runs the final publisher-side auction and to share DFP data with the new industry host while also funding it via escrow. This isn’t increasing competition in the market; it’s a compulsory technology transfer project, accompanied by permanent governance, with all the associated coordination, security, and IP risks. Notably, several of these mandates don’t align with the harms the court actually identified. 

As the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) points out, the most far-reaching “data and transparency” remedies target buyer-side tools, which the court recognized were not monopolized. Further, the requirement to share DFP data with an industry auction host looks less like restoring competition and more like a lever to force DFP divestiture. That is not “tailored to fit the wrong”—it’s policy by decree.

— Joseph V. Coniglio wrote that “the last of the data and transparency remedies, which requires Google ‘to share DFP data that improves auction logic with the industry organization hosting the open-source final publisher ad server auction,’ is merely part of the DOJ’s scheme to ultimately force Google to divest DFP.”

If the goal is to increase competition in ad tech, the remedy should be targeted, workable, and grounded in the liability findings. Breaking apart assets and mandating open-source auctions and broad data transfers will raise costs, disrupt publisher monetization, and chill innovation. Tailored, evidence-based conduct remedies—backed by clear interoperability and transparency requirements—can effectively address the identified issues without turning courts into long-term market designers.