Yelp sues Google for alleged anti-competitive practices

Yelp, an online review platform, has filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing the tech giant of anti-competitive behaviour that has adversely affected Yelp's business.

In a blog post, Yelp co-founder and CEO Jeremy Stoppelman claimed that Google has unlawfully exploited its search engine dominance to control the local search and local search advertising markets. “With our action, we aim to safeguard competition, protect consumer choice, recover damages, and prevent Google from engaging in anticompetitive practices so that innovation may flourish,” Stoppelman said.

Yelp stated that when users perform local searches on Google, the company skews the results to highlight its own local search features over those of competitors, even if Google's offerings are of lower quality. This practice allows Google to bypass the ranking criteria it applies to other websites.

Yelp also claimed that Google's "self-preferencing" prevents competitors from gaining scale, which in turn negatively impacts advertisers. “Google’s conduct suppresses competition in the local search advertising market, ensuring that more local advertisers turn to Google,” said Stoppelman.

In a statement to The Verge, a Google spokesperson said, “Yelp’s claims are not new. Similar claims were thrown out years ago by the FTC and recently by the judge in the DOJ’s case. On the other aspects of the decision to which Yelp refers, we are appealing. Google will vigorously defend against Yelp’s meritless claims.”

Yelp's lawsuit follows a US federal judge's finding that Google has illegally maintained a monopoly in the general search market for years. “We believe our lawsuit takes a critical step towards a level playing field in which Yelp and other local search providers can effectively compete, and provide consumers with the best local search experience,” said Stoppelman.