Lawsuit accuses Google of giving Facebook "Ad Auctions Info”

Search giant Google was hit on Tuesday with yet another lawsuit concerning its questionable actions for conspiring with social media titan Facebook for giving “special information” for online advertising auctions.

Two Massachusetts law firms accused Google of conspiring in illegal deals with Facebook to provide the social network with biased privileges in online advertising auctions.

The lawsuit referenced previous accusations built in an antitrust complaint against Google. During that time, the states accused Google of illegally conspiring with the social networking titan – one of Google’s ultimate competitors in the digital advertising market – following Facebook’s threats to attack the search engine’s dominion on the market.

In its venture to try and prevent Facebook from making its move, Google supposedly reached out to its opponent and tried to defuse the threats it found itself exposed to, leading to Facebook backing off after Google agreed to grant the social networking platform “special information, a speed advantage to assist Facebook in succeeding in the auctions, and a guaranteed win rate,” according to Tuesday’s complaint.

“To sufficiently incentivize Facebook, Google and Facebook agreed to fix prices and allocate markets between them in the auctions for publishers’ web displays and in-app advertising,” the complaint stated.

“Given the scope and extensive nature of cooperation between Google and Facebook, they were highly aware that their activities could trigger antitrust violations,” it added.

Both platforms addressed the issue respectively.

Search engine giant’s spokesman handled the issue by pointing to a blog post Google published in January responding to the Texas lawsuit. Google referred to the suit as a “misleading attack on our ad tech business.”

In parallel, the social networking giant dismissed any allegations under the pretense that “partnerships like this are common in the industry.” As for the lawsuit itself, Facebook refused to release any statement.