On September 2, Judge Leonie Brinkema of the Eastern District of Virginia issued her remedies decision in the government's ad tech case against Google. It was unsealed on September 16. She declined to order the divestiture the Justice Department wanted and imposed behavioral remedies instead. The choice is defensible, and it should be judged by whether the conduct rules work rather than by whether a breakup happened.
The case for the breakup
The strongest argument for structural relief is about incentives. Google ran the publisher ad server, the exchange and the tools that buy on advertisers' behalf. A firm in that position can write rules in one market that favor its own products in another, and rules about conduct are notoriously hard to police. The Justice Department's April 17, 2025 announcement said the court found Google had unlawfully monopolized open-web digital advertising markets. The court found that Google harmed its publishing customers, the competitive process and consumers of information on the open web. If the conflict of interest is the disease, separating the businesses looks like the cure. The European Commission reached that view when it fined Google €2.95 billion a year ago, saying divestment appeared to be the only way to resolve the conflict, according to The Next Web's account.
That argument is serious. But it needs a breakup that is practical, and it needs proof that conduct rules cannot work.
What the court ordered instead
According to Tech Policy Press, the 106-page decision requires Google to integrate AdX and its publisher ad server, DoubleClick for Publishers, with Prebid, the open-source header bidding framework. Google must deprecate Unified Pricing Rules and may not reimplement them. UPR was the price-parity condition that constrained how publishers could route inventory to rival exchanges. Google is also barred from bringing back First Look and Last Look, which let it see competing bids before placing its own. Publishers get historical and configuration data from DoubleClick, plus ongoing AdX bid data, so they can move to rival ad servers.
The Justice Department's September 16 statement describes non-discrimination limits on AdWords bidding and a six-year monitor working with a technical committee. AdExchanger reports that the DOJ had asked for 15 years and that the monitor gets access to Google's employees, systems and source code. The same account says the requirements apply globally rather than only in the US.
This package goes straight at the mechanisms that produced the liability finding. The tie between the exchange and the ad server was the core of the case. Prebid integration, the end of UPR and data portability all attack that tie. They lower switching costs for publishers, and switching costs are what let a dominant intermediary keep its position.
Why divestiture was the riskier bet
The reasons the court gave, as reported, are practical. AdExchanger says she weighed the length and uncertainty of an appeal, the risk to small businesses and publishers that rely on Google's infrastructure, and the disruption a forced sale would cause. Each of these carries real weight. A divestiture ordered in 2026 would likely be stayed and litigated for years. Publishers would keep operating in the same market while it played out, and the behavioral rules would arrive later or never.
Behavioral remedies can take effect on a shorter clock. AdExchanger reports that proposed final judgments are due October 2 and the remedy would take effect 60 days after the judge signs, though Google is expected to appeal. Even with an appeal, the interoperability regime is far closer to implementation than a forced sale of a live global exchange would be.
A breakup also does not guarantee competition. A standalone AdX would still need publishers, advertisers and liquidity. Open standards like Prebid do more for a challenger's odds than a change of ownership does, because they let rivals compete on the same terms from day one.
The real risk is enforcement
The skeptic's worry deserves an answer. Behavioral remedies have a poor record when the defendant controls the technical details. A six-year monitor with source-code access is the court's answer, and it is meaningfully stronger than an honor-system consent decree. The design is right, but the outcome depends on execution.
Three tests will show whether the remedy works. The first is whether Prebid integrations are actually built to parity with Google's own paths, or degrade in latency and features. The second is whether publishers use the new data portability to leave, since exits are the measurable result. The third is whether the monitor publishes enough for outsiders to judge compliance. Regulators and courts should demand that transparency, because rules that cannot be audited by the public are easy to hollow out.
The transatlantic consequence
The ruling leaves the European Commission as the last regulator arguing for structural separation. According to The Next Web, Google's November 2025 compliance proposal offered operational changes rather than a sale, and the Commission extended its assessment in March 2026. Tech Policy Press reports that Competition chief Teresa Ribera signaled the EU should try to stay consistent with authorities elsewhere, while some EU lawmakers want the breakup option preserved.
There is also a practical constraint. Google's ad tools run as one global system, so an EU-only divestiture would be very hard to enforce. A US order that already imposes global interoperability makes a parallel EU regime cheaper to align with. Brussels can now choose to build on the US template and focus on non-discrimination rules and enforcement rather than a fight over ownership.
What to take from it
This is what proportionate competition enforcement looks like. The court found a violation, targeted the mechanisms that caused the harm, and chose remedies it could monitor and that publishers can test in the market. Structural remedies should remain available where behavioral ones demonstrably fail. Brinkema's order shows that a well-designed conduct remedy can be the faster path to restoring competition in the market. Its worth will be measured in publisher choice rather than in headlines about the breakup that did not happen.