The Department of Justice’s antitrust case against Google marks a watershed in digital advertising. But while proposed remedies like forcing Google to divest its ad exchange (AdX) may target real problems, focusing narrowly on Google’s ad tech pipes risks missing the larger imbalance in the open internet.
The auction has never been the real center of power, and it will not be in the future. What will decide the fate of the open web is who controls the data that drives monetization and the artificial intelligence that determines distribution.
Google holds the advantage in both, yet the proposed remedies in the ad tech antitrust trial do not address it. Unless regulation tackles these deeper asymmetries, the open web will weaken while walled gardens and foreign platforms grow stronger.
Addressing data asymmetry
The DOJ’s divestiture plan aims to reduce reliance on Google but risks fragmenting liquidity and destabilizing publisher revenues. Google’s counterproposals, focused on interoperability and data exports, may avoid disruption but preserve its closed-loop identity graph and AI edge. In short: DOJ risks overcorrection; Google risks no correction at all. Neither resolves the structural data imbalance shaping the future, because the central issue has never been the auction itself.
The open web relies on shared liquidity but remains fragile and fragmented due to data asymmetry. Walled gardens like Meta, Amazon and TikTok control closed ecosystems with logged-in identity graphs, outcome data and integrated ad markets, advantages publishers cannot replicate.
Ironically, forcing Google to spin off AdX could push it deeper into its walled gardens, YouTube, Search and AI-driven products, where it controls both distribution and monetization. Instead of empowering the open web, such a remedy could accelerate advertiser migration into closed ecosystems, leaving publishers weaker. Regulators must weigh whether breaking apart pipes risks consolidating even more power behind the walls.
Addressing AI distribution
AI intensifies the asymmetry. Industry estimates suggest products like Google’s Search Generative Experience are already reducing referral traffic to publishers by 20%-40% in some categories. Digital Content Next examined publisher traffic during May and June and found that Google referrals had fallen by as much as 25% YOY.
Lost traffic means lost revenue and weaker bargaining power, compounded by the fact that AI systems often repurpose publisher content without clear rules on copyright, control or compensation.
These shifts occur regardless of how auctions are structured and demonstrate that remedies aimed only at ad tech pipes cannot restore balance. Unless AI’s role in redirecting attention and monetization is addressed, publishers will continue to lose even if data access becomes more reciprocal.
Industrywide solutions
- Data reciprocity: Platforms should provide publishers with the same data fields they use internally, query-level logs, engagement metrics, conversion data and auction diagnostics. Without symmetry, the imbalance persists.
- AI attribution and compensation: Generative AI must visibly cite sources. Where platforms monetize publisher-trained content, through ads, subscriptions or SaaS/API services, publishers should share in revenues. Compensation could take the form of revenue sharing, licensing, statutory frameworks or collective bargaining.
- Transparent economics: Standardized auction logs and revenue-share disclosures must apply across all players, including Google, Magnite, PubMatic, Meta, Amazon and TikTok.
- Shared responsibility: Regulators must act, but publishers must also invest in first-party data strategies, diversified revenue models and new formats that meet audiences on the open web, in video and on emerging platforms.
Enforcement will require independent audits, open APIs and global alignment. The DMA demonstrates that rules-based governance of complex digital markets is feasible. While imperfect, it offers a model for addressing multiple gatekeepers simultaneously rather than on a case-by-case basis.
A fairer marketplace would also benefit advertisers, because data reciprocity and AI transparency would improve ROI measurement, reduce waste and enable cross-platform comparability.
Solving the deeper issue
The DOJ’s case is historic, and Google’s responses are tactical. But neither resolves the deeper issue: control of data and the growing role of AI in shaping distribution.
The path forward must be industrywide rather than targeted to one company’s practices. By mandating data reciprocity, ensuring AI attribution and fair compensation and creating transparent economics across platforms, regulators can restore balance.
Confronting how data is controlled and how AI redirects traffic is the only way to preserve a sustainable open web. The future of the open web and the independent journalism it supports will depend on whether remedies address this reality.
“The Sell Sider” is a column written by the sell side of the digital media community.
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