Judge Dismisses Chegg and Penske Lawsuits Against Google AI Search
A US federal judge has dismissed antitrust lawsuits filed by education platform Chegg and media company Penske Media against Google. The companies accused Google's AI search features of reducing website traffic.
US District Judge Amit Mehta has dismissed antitrust lawsuits brought by education services provider Chegg and media company Penske Media against Google. The companies had accused Google of antitrust violations related to its AI search features, such as AI Overviews, which they claim have significantly reduced traffic to numerous websites.
The lawsuits were filed in 2025, with Google requesting dismissal earlier this year. Chegg alleged that Google illegally scraped its educational content to train its AI models, leading to reduced traffic on its own platform. Penske Media, owner of publications like Rolling Stone and Variety, filed a similar case citing lost traffic.
The publishers argued it was unfair for content indexed for organic search to be used for AI-generated answers without an opt-out option. However, these arguments did not sway the judge.
Judge Mehta ruled that Google's conduct does not violate antitrust law. "Plaintiffs have pleaded only that they have an ‘expectation’ that Google will send them search traffic if they make their content available for free," Mehta wrote. "But an expectation is not an agreement. It is simply how a general search engine works."