A US judge found Google broke antitrust law by creating a monopoly through payments to companies to make its search engine the default setting on mobile phones and browsers.

The court’s 276-page ruling found “Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly” by working to ensure its online search and related advertising capabilities are featured over rivals such as Microsoft’s Bing.

Alphabet-owned Google has search engine deals in place with smartphone companies Apple and Samsung as well as browsers such as Mozilla to make its search engine the default across their products. It also has agreements in place with mobile operators.

Google makes its search engine the default across some of the apps on its Play Store for phone OEMs using its Android operating system.

Bloomberg reported Google paid $26.3 billion in 2021 to companies to ensure default placements of its search engine through distribution contracts.

A representative for Google told Mobile World Live the company plans to appeal the ruling.

“This decision recognizes that Google offers the best search engine but concludes that we shouldn’t be allowed to make it easily available,” according to a statement from Kent Walker, president of Google global affairs.

He noted the ruling finds that Google is “the industry’s highest quality search engine, which has earned Google the trust of hundreds of millions of daily users,” and that it “has long been the best search engine, particularly on mobile devices”.

While the ruling is in the US Department of Justice’s favour, it did not include possible remedies or actions.