John Giannandrea, a former top Google executive who decamped to Apple Inc to head its artificial intelligence business, pointed out a quiet change in the latest iPhone software update that allows users to select a search engine other than Google’s when browsing the internet in private mode.
The iOS 17, released on Monday (Sept 18), added “a second setting, so you could choose two different” search engines, Giannandrea said in testimony in federal court in Washington as part of the Justice Department’s antitrust suit against Alphabet Inc’s Google.
The change enables iPhone users to easily switch between Google and another search engine with a single tap.
The difficulty of switching search engines has been a subject of heated debate in the US government’s antitrust suit, which accuses Google of illegally maintaining its monopoly over online search through contracts with web browsers and smartphone manufacturers, including Apple.
In its opening statement last week, Google claimed that it’s easy for users to change search engines in a “matter of seconds.” However, Gabriel Weinberg, the CEO of rival search engine DuckDuckGo, testified on Thursday that Google’s default status on browsers acts as a barrier to user switching, stating that there are “just too many steps.”
Under Google’s contract with Apple, it is the pre-selected, or default, search engine in Safari, the web browser for iPhone, iPad, and Mac computers. In return, Google pays Apple a portion of its advertising revenue. Although the exact amount is confidential, the Justice Department previously stated that Google pays Apple between US$4bil (RM18.77bil) and US$7bil (RM32.84bil) annually.
In his testimony, Giannandrea confirmed that Google will remain the default search engine for Safari in private mode, which does not retain a history of visited websites. However, he also mentioned that users will now have the option to choose Yahoo Inc, Microsoft Corp’s Bing, DuckDuckGo, or Ecosia for private browsing.
Giannandrea, who worked at Google from 2010 to 2018 as senior vice president of engineering for search, now heads Apple’s AI and machine learning initiatives. He briefly testified on Thursday (Sept 21) and returned for over four hours on Friday (Sept 22) for a sealed session.
Credit: The Star : Tech Feed
