Google has illegal monopoly over internet search, US judge rules
The case depicted Google as a technological bully that methodically thwarted competition to protect its search engine. A judge in the United States has ruled that Google spent billions of dollars to create an illegal monopoly for its search engine, exploiting its dominance to squash competition and stifle innovation. Monday’s landmark decision that Google broke antitrust law marks the first major success for US authorities taking on the dominance of Big Tech, which has come under fire from across the political spectrum. “The court reaches the following conclusion: Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” US District Judge Amit Mehta wrote in his 277-page ruling. Google’s dominance in the search market was evidence of its monopoly, the ruling found. Google “enjoys an 89.2% share of the market for general search services, which increases to 94.9% on mobile devices”, the ruling said. US Attorney General Merrick Garland called the decision “a historic win for the American people”, adding that “no company – no matter how large or influential – is above the law”. The decision represents a major setback for Google and its parent company, Alphabet, which had argued that its popularity stemmed from consumers’ overwhelming desire to use a search engine that has become synonymous with looking things up online. Google’s search engine processes an estimated 8.5 billion queries every day worldwide, nearly double its daily volume from 12 years ago, according to a recent study by investment firm BOND. Google’s global affairs president, Kent Walker, said the company would appeal the ruling, noting that Mehta had characterised Google as the industry’s best search engine. “Given this, and that people are increasingly looking for information in more and more ways, we plan to appeal,” Walker said. The ruling paves the way for a second trial to determine potential remedies, possibly including a breakup of Alphabet, which would change the landscape of the online advertising world that Google has dominated for years. The ruling is the first major decision in a series of cases taking on alleged monopolies in Big Tech including Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, Amazon and Apple. The Google case, filed by the administration of former President Donald Trump, went before a judge from September to November of last year. Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee’s antitrust subcommittee, said the fact that the case continued across administrations showed strong bipartisan support for antitrust enforcement. “It’s a huge victory for the American people that antitrust enforcement is alive and well when it comes to competition,” she said. “Google is a rampant monopolist.” The case depicted Google as a technological bully that methodically thwarted competition to protect a search engine that has become the centrepiece of a digital advertising machine that generated nearly $240bn in revenue last year. Justice Department lawyers argued that Google’s monopoly enabled it to charge advertisers artificially high prices while also enjoying the luxury of not having to invest more time and money into improving the quality of its search engine – a lax approach which hurt users. Mehta’s ruling highlighted the billions of dollars Google spends every year to install its search engine as the default option on new mobile phones and electronic gadgets. In 2021 alone, Google spent more than $26bn to lock in those default agreements, the judge said. Experts said the appeal process was likely to take years, however, and that was likely to delay any immediate impact on users and advertisers. Adblock test (Why?)
Rebels in Indonesia’s Papua kill New Zealand pilot in second plane attack
Glen Malcolm Conning was shot dead after he landed his helicopter in a remote village, 19 months after another pilot was taken captive. Separatist fighters in Indonesia’s far eastern region of Papua have shot dead a helicopter pilot from New Zealand, according to police. The rebels attacked the helicopter as soon as it landed on Monday in Alama, a remote village in the Mimika district of Central Papua province, said Faizal Ramadhani, who heads the joint security peace force in Papua. The attackers released the four Indigenous Papuan passengers who were on board the aircraft, operated by private aviation company Intan Angkasa Air Service. “It is confirmed that there was a hostage situation and murder carried out by the armed criminal group,” Ramadhani said, naming the pilot as 50-year-old Glen Malcolm Conning. The motive for the killing was not immediately clear. It comes nearly 18 months after the abduction by separatists of another pilot from New Zealand, Phillip Mehrtens, who remains a captive. A spokesperson for New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it was aware of the report and that its embassy in Jakarta was seeking information from authorities, declining to comment further. Conning was from Motueka in the north of New Zealand’s South Island and an experienced pilot, who had flown missions earlier this year to fight bushfires near Christchurch, The New Zealand Herald reported. “[Glen] was greatly loved by the Motueka community and was a great family man,” close friend Kerry Gatenby told the paper. A battle for independence has been rumbling for decades in Papua, a resource-rich region that is the location of one of the world’s biggest gold and copper mines. The conflict has escalated since 2018 when separatist fighters attacked a group working on a major road project, killing 19 Indonesian construction workers. Mehrtens was captured in February 2023 after fighters from the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPN-PB) ambushed a small commercial plane when it landed in the remote, mountainous area of Nduga. They said they would release him only when Papua got its independence from Indonesia. Police said the TPN-PB were also behind Monday’s attack. The group is the armed wing of the Free Papua Movement (OPM) and in 2021 was designated a “terrorist’ organisation by Indonesia. TPN-PB spokesman Sebby Samborn told news agencies that he had not received reports from the group’s fighters about the killing. “But, if that happens, it was his own fault for entering our forbidden territory,” Sambom was quoted as saying by the Associated Press news agency. “We have released warnings several times that the area is under our restricted zone, an armed conflict area that is prohibited for any civilian aircraft to land.” Papua, whose people are ethnically and culturally distinct from Indonesia, occupies the western half of the island of New Guinea – just 200km (124 miles) north of Australia – and shares a land border with Papua New Guinea (PNG). A former Dutch colony, the territory was incorporated into Indonesia in 1969 after a controversial United Nations-backed referendum in which only about 1,000 Papuans were able to participate. Adblock test (Why?)
It’s official: Vice President Kamala Harris formally wins the Democratic presidential nomination
Vice President Kamala Harris is now formally the Democratic Party’s 2024 presidential nominee. The Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced the news on Monday, following the conclusion of a five-day virtual roll call of pledged delegates to the party’s national convention, which kicks off in two weeks in Chicago. The securing of the nomination comes hours before Harris is expected to announce her choice for running mate. The vice president and her to-be-announced running mate kick off a seven-battleground state swing Tuesday evening with a rally in Philadelphia. Monday’s formal winning of the nomination came three days after Harris secured the votes of a majority of pledged delegates. “I am so proud to confirm that Vice President Harris has earned more than a majority of votes from all convention delegates and will be the nominee of the Democratic Party following the close of voting on Monday,” DNC chair Jaime Harrison said in a statement on Friday. Harris, on a call Friday with supporters, said, “I am honored to be the presumptive Democratic nominee for President of the United States.” The nomination of Harris was never in doubt, as the vice president was the only candidate to qualify for the presidential nomination roll call. But it marks an historic milestone in the nation’s history, as Harris becomes the first woman of color to lead a major political party’s national ticket. While the official nomination vote by the delegates was held remotely, the DNC said a ceremonial roll call will be held at the Democratic National Convention, which is set to kick off Aug. 19 in Chicago. Harris’ formal winning of the nomination comes two weeks and one day after President Biden’s blockbuster announcement that he was ending his 2024 re-election campaign against former President Trump, the GOP’s nominee. Biden’s stunning news came amid mounting pressure from within the Democratic Party for him to drop out after a disastrous performance in last month’s first presidential debate with Trump. The 81-year-old Biden’s halting and stumbling delivery fueled questions about his physical and mental abilities to serve another four years in the White House. But Biden’s immediate backing of Harris ignited a surge of endorsements for the vice president by Democratic governors, senators, House members and other party leaders. Within 36 hours, Harris announced that she had locked up her party’s nomination by landing the verbal backing of a majority of the nearly 4,000 convention delegates. With the presidential nomination virtual roll call now concluded, DNC rules allow for Harris to place the name of her running mate into nomination. According to the DNC, the convention chair would then declare that candidate to be the party’s vice presidential nominee. Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.
Sen. Hawley reveals new whistleblower claims about Secret Service failures at Trump rally: ‘Scared to death’
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., appeared on “Jesse Watters Primetime” on Monday night to reveal new claims regarding the assassination attempt against former President Trump last month. Hawley told host Jesse Watters that he had spoken with whistleblowers who provided him with information about the U.S. Secret Service (USSS) lead site agent at the Butler, Pennsylvania, rally on July 13. In the middle of the rally, gunman Thomas Matthew Crooks shot Trump from a sloped roof, hitting him in the ear and killing one attendee. The 20-year-old had also injured two others before he was killed by Secret Service agents. The incident has led both Republicans and Democrats to intensely scrutinize the Secret Service in recent weeks. On “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Hawley claimed that the lead site agent was known to be inexperienced and “incompetent.” TRUMP SHOOTING: TIMELINE OF ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT “The site agent, the lead agent, was known to the Trump campaign to be inexperienced, to be ineffectual, to be, frankly, incompetent at their job,” Hawley said. “I’m also told by whistleblowers that on that day, she was not enforcing the normal security protocols.” “She was not checking people’s IDs. She did not use Secret Service agents,” Hawley added. “Most of the agents there that day were not Secret Service agents. They were Homeland Security agents.” The Missouri senator also claimed that some Secret Service agents are unhappy with how the agency has handled the shooting. “Whistleblowers are coming forward from the Secret Service because they can’t believe what leadership is doing,” Hawley said. “They cannot believe that Secret Service is not taking action to clear out the rot.” VIDEO FROM TRUMP ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT VICTIM’S POV SHOWS FIGURE MOVING ON ROOF MOMENTS BEFORE GUNFIRE “Frankly, they’re scared to death [that] this is going to happen again. We can’t let it happen again. We’ve got to get the facts,” the Republican concluded. Shortly after the interview, Hawley made an X post about a scathing letter he had sent to Secret Service acting director Ronald L. Rowe on Monday. In the letter, Hawley demanded to know why the lead site agent was assigned to the rally and why certain protocols were not followed. “I urge you to suspend the lead site agent from all Secret Service duties immediately while these claims are investigated,” Hawley wrote. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Fox News Digital reached out to the Secret Service for comment, but did not immediately hear back.
Excise policy case: Delhi HC says CM Arvind Kejriwal’s arrest by CBI valid, there’s no malice
The high court noted that the loop of evidence against CM Kejriwal was closed after the collection of relevant evidence following his arrest by the CBI and it cannot be said that it was without any justifiable reason or illegal.
Defense Secretary Austin taken by surprise upon news of 9/11 plea deals: ‘Not consulted’
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was surprised by news of a deal struck between prosecutors and the mastermind and two others who planned the Sept. 11 attacks. “This is not something that the secretary was consulted on,” Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters during a Monday briefing. “We were not aware that the prosecution or defense would enter the terms of the plea agreement.” The Biden administration revoked the deal amid public outrage and anger from loved ones of the victims. PHILADELPHIA MAYOR’S SOCIAL MEDIA VIDEO SPARKS SPECULATION OF LEAKED KAMALA HARRIS RUNNING MATE “He believes that the families and the American public deserve the opportunity to see military commission trials carried out in this case,” said Singh. Austin revoked the agreement last week after prosecutors agreed to move forward with the deal that would have taken the death penalty off the table for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammad, and collaborators Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin ‘Attash, and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi. The defendants are being held at a military installation in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. “Effective immediately, in the exercise of my authority, I hereby withdraw from the three pretrial agreements that you signed on July 31, 2024,” a letter from Austin states. That decision was made by retired brigadier general and senior Defense Department official Susan Escallier, whom Austin had tapped to serve in the Office of Military Commissions (OMC), the New York Post reported. LAWMAKERS, FAMILIES OF 9/11 VICTIMS REACT TO PLEA DEAL WITH TERRORISTS: ‘SLAP IN THE FACE’ No explanation was given on why this was not settled earlier before the deals were signed off and publicly released. The deal shocked the loved ones of the 9/11 victims as well as lawmakers who blamed Biden for going easy on the terrorists. “They’re the ones that want this off of their plate. It’s an election year,” Terry Strada, the national chair of 9/11 Families United, told Fox News Digital. “They (terrorists) committed this heinous crime against the United States. They should have faced the charges, faced the trial and faced the punishment. Since when do the people responsible for murder get to call the shots?” National security adviser Jake Sullivan said the Biden administration did not play a role in the now-dead plea bargain. “This is not something that we were involved in,” Jean-Pierre told reporters last week. “We had no role in that process. The president had no role. The vice president had no role. I had no role. The White House had no role,” Sullivan said in a Thursday press briefing. “And we were informed yesterday — the same day that they went out publicly — that this pretrial agreement had been accepted by the convening authority.”
Taxpayers expected to save millions after COVID-era perk for illegal immigrants gets cancelled
EXCLUSIVE: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) ended a COVID-era program that granted hundreds of free minutes of video calls to illegal immigrants, Fox News Digital has learned — a move that is estimated to save taxpayers more than $10 million a year. The federal agency began offering illegal immigrants in custody 520 minutes of free domestic and international phone and video calls per month in May 2020 due to the then-emerging COVID-19 pandemic and visitation restrictions that were implemented as a consequence. The cost of the program is $10.2 million a year. The public health emergency for the pandemic ended in May 2023, but the program remained in effect even as in-person visitation has resumed with the ending of social distancing requirements. BIDEN ADMIN PUSHES TO REOPEN IMMIGRANT DETENTION CENTER AMID LINGERING COVID-ERA FREEZE ICE says that while it continued the program until it started winding down throughout June of this year, cost-saving measures have since become a priority due to other resources needed at the southern border. “Individuals in detention still have access to facility Wi-Fi to make telephone and video calls to contact their attorneys and families and may also make calls at their own expense [using] facility telephones and video tablets as available,” an ICE official said. The agency also said that if it is given appropriate resources by Congress, it could continue to allow free calls in the future. SCATHING REPORT REVEALS BIDEN-HARRIS ADMIN HAS RELEASED DOZENS OF MIGRANTS ON TERROR WATCHLIST INTO US “Although ICE is grateful for the fiscal year 2024 appropriations it received from Congress, current funding is insufficient to maintain operational readiness on multiple fronts while offering free calls, which cost American taxpayers over $0.50 per minute,” the agency said. Funding has been a key issue of debate among lawmakers and officials over how to handle the ongoing crisis at the southern border, Democrats and the Biden administration have accused Republicans of failing to support measures to provide additional funding for resources to deal with the border crisis — including a bipartisan bill unveiled this year that has so far failed to make it out of the Senate. CLICK HERE FOR MORE COVERAGE OF THE BORDER SECURITY CRISIS Republicans have noted that they have passed their own comprehensive border package in the House, which includes additional funding as well as strict limits on asylum and parole. It has failed to pick up Democratic support. Meanwhile, some COVID-era restrictions are still in place. The Biden administration has recently urged a federal judge to end a ban on new detainees at a facility in Adelanto, California. The facility in Adelanto, California, can house nearly 2,000 inmates but was blocked by a September 2020 court order in response to a lawsuit from immigrant activists calling for fewer inmates due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It has held just a handful of inmates ever since.
DPS reinstates Texas Ranger fired for Uvalde shooting response
Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw said he made the decision after the Uvalde district attorney found no criminal wrongdoing and asked that Ranger Chris Kindell be allowed to return to his job.
Trump’s Georgia problem: ‘Neck and neck’ with VP Harris as candidates fight for battleground states
Former President Trump’s tight race with VP Harris is bringing Georgia – a historically red state-turned-blue – back to the forefront this election cycle as the two candidates are “neck and neck” in the Peach State’s polls. And Trump’s rhetoric could swing the state one way or another, according to experts. In the 2020 presidential election, it was assumed Georgia was reliably Republican, as it had been for more than four decades. However, not only did Trump lose, but the state also saw two Senate losses for Republicans, which decided Senate control. “They’re neck and neck in Georgia,” Tevi Troy, presidential historian and former deputy secretary of Health and Human Services in the George W. Bush administration, told Fox News Digital. “In 2020, we were still operating under the assumption that Georgia was Republican territory as it had been pretty reliable for a long time, and then not only did Trump lose, but then you had those two Senate losses that came right after the election in January that determined the control in the Senate.” GEORGIA ACTIVIST STEALS SHOW AFTER BEING INTRODUCED BY TRUMP AT ATLANTA RALLY: ‘INCREDIBLE’ “I think some of the defeat stems from Trump’s behavior in that period. So, I think he has to be careful about what he says and how he approaches Georgia, because in the neck-and-neck state, if you alienate the state, that could make an impact,” he said. Georgia’s electorate includes a mix of traditional rural voters, who have historically supported Republicans, and a newer demographic of wealthier, educated voters often leaning Democrat, particularly in the Atlanta suburbs. Additionally, Troy noted, Black voters make up a significant portion of the electorate, which has traditionally leaned heavily Democrat. Recent indications suggest Trump is performing somewhat better among Black voters, especially Black men, which could impact the overall voting dynamics if he can reduce the Democrat dominance in this group, he added. TRUMP RALLIES SUPPORTERS IN ATLANTA AS 2024 PRESIDENTIAL RACE HEATS UP Georgia-based radio host Erick Erickson, also a former councilmember in Macron, told Fox News Digital, “Over 30,000 people refused to vote for Trump in Georgia in 2020, and he lost by about 12,000 votes.” “All he’s doing is reminding everyone why they don’t like him,” Erickson said. “And he has no Georgia ground game and will have to rely on Kemp. It’s going to hurt him.” But old tensions resurfaced between Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, and the former president during Trump’s rally in Atlanta over the weekend, when Trump criticized Kemp for refusing to overturn the 2020 election results. The governor responded by suggesting Trump should focus on winning in November and refrain from “petty personal insults, attacking fellow Republicans or dwelling on the past.” HARRIS MOCKED FOR ‘FAKE’ SOUTHERN ACCENT DURING GEORGIA RALLY Meanwhile, Harris also headlined a rally in Atlanta last week when she stood in front of roughly 10,000 attendees – the largest for this cycle for the Democratic Party’s national ticket – which featured a performance by hip-hop star Megan Thee Stallion. Fox News Digital’s Landion Mion and Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.
Harris says ‘everybody needs to be woke’ in unearthed clip spreading like wildfire on social media
A clip of Vice President Kamala Harris from 2017 calling on “everybody” to be “woke” resurfaced on social media, sparking critics and conservatives to lambaste the official Democratic nominee as a “Communist functionary” who is “too radical” to serve as president. “We have to stay woke. Like everybody needs to be woke. And you can talk about if you’re the wokest or woker, but just stay more woke than less woke,” then-Sen. Harris said in 2017 during Recode’s annual Code Conference, alongside philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, during the conference. The conference focused on issues such as immigration and the environment, including Harris speaking out against the Trump administration’s drug policies and immigration polices just moments ahead of her call on Americans to be “woke.” “I get upset when we say we’re going to shut our door to refugees who are fleeing such atrocities and have been standing in line for two years to qualify for refugee status, and they arrive here, and we turn them away. Yes, I’m gonna get mad about that. I’m gonna get mad when we have an attorney general who’s trying to resuscitate the war on drugs. And he thinks the greatest evil that mankind has ever seen is marijuana. … Leave grandma’s medical marijuana alone,” Harris said. DOUG EMHOFF’S EX-WIFE RESPONDS AFTER SECOND GENTLEMAN ADMITTED TO AFFAIR WITH NANNY Harris doubled down on her comment in a message posted to X a day later, which read: “We have to stay active. We have to stay woke.” The use of the word “woke” grew in popularity in 2017, when dictionaries such as Oxford and Merriam-Webster added the phrase to their lexicons, defining it as people who are attentive to issues such as social justice. It has since become a catch-all word for left-wing issues and agendas. 2024 SHOWDOWN: TRUMP CAMPAIGN REJOICES AFTER HARRIS LEANS IN ON KEY ISSUE HAUNTING HER VICE PRESIDENCY Seven years after Harris joined the 2017 conference, critics on social media are lambasting the presumptive Democratic nominee over the clip, including conservative author James Lindsay describing Harris as a “Communist functionary.” “Kamala is a low-level Communist functionary, and I’m tired of being told we have to pretend she’s not,” he wrote. KAMALA HARRIS SUPPORTED ‘DEFUND THE POLICE’ IN 2020 RADIO INTERVIEW, BEFORE BIDEN CAMPAIGN SAID OTHERWISE Fox News Digital reached out to the Harris campaign for comment on the clip and criticism, but did not immediately receive a reply. The clip comes after President Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race late last month, which was shortly followed by him endorsing his vice president to pursue winning the White House in his place. Harris officially clinched her party’s 2024 presidential nomination on Friday, earning more than a majority of votes from convention delegates, the DNC reported. Harris now has fewer than 100 days ahead of Nov. 5 to court voters ahead of facing off against former President Donald Trump at the polls. As Harris builds up her campaign, critics have unearthed a bevy of news articles and video clips of the presumptive Democratic nominee, such as her voicing support to the defund the police movement in 2020, and her praise of a pastor who blamed the U.S. for the 9/11 attacks. Harris is anticipated to announce her running mate in the race this week, who will head with her to Chicago later this month for the Democratic National Convention. Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.