Google should face sanctions for failing to save records of chat messages between employees as part of an antitrust case brought by Epic Games, a federal judge has ruled.
In Tuesday's verdict, U.S. District Judge James Donato said Google employed a "don’t ask, don’t tell policy" for retaining messages, which came "at the expense of its preservation duties."
- Donato said Google gave more than 300 employees "carte blanche" to decide whether to save their chat history and messages, which are typically auto-deleted after 24 hours.
- The chats are considered possible evidence in Epic's lawsuit targeting Google's app store policies, Donato said.
- The judge did not issue the sanctions yet, saying it will require more proceedings to determine an appropriate non-monetary penalty.
- Epic has argued that Google should have made sure the chats were saved by default.
- In response, a Google spokesperson said the company's teams have worked for years to respond to discovery requests in the litigation, producing thousands of chats and more than 3 million documents.
- Similarly, the U.S. Justice Department has asked a court to sanction Google for allegedly auto-deleting employee chats that were required for an antitrust lawsuit.
- Google has denied the DOJ's allegations, which stem from the department lawsuit filed in 2020 over Google's monopoly in search and search advertising.
