The United States, 17 state plaintiffs and Google LLC returned a 41-page proposed final judgment to the Eastern District of Virginia on October 2, 2026, and the text shows that the two sides still disagree on implementation deadlines, geographic reach, data rights and the authority of a court-appointed monitor, according to the docket in United States v. Google LLC, No. 1:23-cv-00108.

In Short

A judge told Google and the government to write one rulebook for how Google's ad-selling tools must treat rivals, and they handed in a draft where each side's preferred wording sits side by side in square brackets. It matters to anyone who buys or sells ads on websites, because the brackets decide how fast rival tools get equal access to Google's auctions and whether that happens worldwide or first in the United States. Nothing is final, since the judge has not signed the document, and every bracket marks a place where she still has to pick a winner.

A document built from brackets

On September 2, 2026, Judge Leonie Brinkema rejected all three structural proposals put forward by the plaintiffs: the sale of AdX, the open-sourcing of the final auction logic inside DFP, and a contingent divestiture of the remaining ad server components. Most behavioral remedies were accepted, with modifications. The two-page order, entered as Document 1857, gave the parties 30 days to confer and file one proposed judgment. Wherever agreement failed, each side had to insert its own version of the provision, labeled by proponent, with no argument or explanation attached.

According to the docket on CourtListener, the plaintiffs' counsel filed the result as Document 1861 on October 2, 2026, the last day of that window. The attachment is titled "[Proposed] Final Judgment" and carries a signature line for Brinkema, undated and blank. Disputed passages appear as "[Plaintiffs: ...]" and "[Google: ...]". Some sections exist only in one version. The plaintiffs' enforcement section and their reservation-of-rights clause, for instance, end with a note that Google omits the section as unnecessary.

The filing follows a memorandum opinion of 106 pages that was lodged under seal on September 2 and unsealed on September 16, according to the court's order at Document 1860. PPC Land covered the unsealed opinion and its six-year, worldwide reach. The opinion itself, according to its text, expects the behavioral remedies to be implemented within 15 months, sets the judgment to take effect 60 days after entry, and orders the process of appointing the monitor and a technical committee to begin immediately.

What the judgment would cover - and what it would not

The scope clauses in Section II are narrow. The judgment applies solely to Indirect Demand, defined as demand to buy inventory through open or private auctions, and only to open-web display inventory, with an exception in Section V.E for direct programmatic deals. It does not apply to AdSense, AdMob, DV360 or any current Google advertising tool other than Google Ad Manager and Google Ads. The definition of open-web display, borrowed from the April 17, 2025 liability opinion, excludes native ads, in-stream video, search ads, social media placements, mobile apps, embedded video players, streaming services and connected television.

That boundary mirrors the liability ruling, in which the court found two markets monopolized and dismissed the claim over advertiser ad networks. Google's version adds a further clause: relief directed at Google Ads would not rest on any finding that Google Ads competes in a relevant market or holds market power. The plaintiffs omit that subsection.

Where the two versions already agree

A considerable part of the text carries no brackets. Google would have to build an adapter that lets a Qualified Prebid Instance send requests to AdX and receive bids in return. A qualified instance is one that compiles in the integration code Google publishes and has not been modified in ways that would force changes on the DFP or AdX side or degrade the signals passed between them. The definition adds that such an instance may be operated by Google. Prebid, the open-source framework behind most header bidding, thus becomes a formal route to Google's demand rather than a workaround.

The text also contains these fixed obligations:

  • A server-to-server link between DFP and Prebid Server within 12 months of the Effective Date, so that Prebid Server instances can submit bids into DFP.
  • A second link within 15 months covering programmatic guaranteed deals and preferred deals between DFP and Prebid Server.
  • Free export of publisher configuration and historical DFP data within three months, with documentation for rival ad servers.
  • A seven-day auction data file within 12 months, listing for each impression the candidate prices and adjustments used in DFP's "final logic", plus technical documentation allowing a publisher to verify the winner independently.
  • Rescission of policies that bar publishers from passing AdX bids through other systems, and written notice to publishers within three months that neither product is required to use the other.
  • From six months after the Effective Date, new or renewed agreements for AdX and DFP only as Separate Contracts.
  • Availability of Header Bidding Trafficking to every DFP publisher customer within six months, regardless of size, usage or subscription to Ad Manager 360.
  • Deprecation of Unified Pricing Rules for indirect demand, with no discount tied to uniform floors, and a ban on reintroducing First Look and Last Look.
  • A prohibition on direct bidding integrations between Google Ads and DFP, although Google Ads may still bid through Prebid.js, Prebid Server or equivalent.

The judgment would expire on the sixth anniversary of the Effective Date unless extended. The Effective Date is defined as 60 days after entry and is tolled day for day during any stay ordered by the district court, the Fourth Circuit or the Supreme Court. Google adds an opening qualifier in Section IV.A, making the effective date subject to the outcome of any motion to stay pending appeal, and a second insertion that brings the monitor provisions inside the six-year term. At closing arguments on November 21, 2025, Brinkema had already remarked that an appeal looked likely.

Where the sides diverge

Deadlines

Most disagreements on timing run in the same direction, with the plaintiffs asking for roughly half the time Google proposes.

ProvisionPlaintiffsGoogle
Adapter for Prebid instances to reach AdX (V.A)6 months12 months
AdX bids into non-Google publisher ad servers (V.B)6 months12 months
Publisher control over request routing (V.I)6 months12 months
Equivalent information to all buying tools (VI.F)12 months18 months
Internal compliance officer designated (VII.B)30 days60 days
Window to dispute a monitor action (VII.A.11)15 days30 days

According to PubMatic, as PPC Land reported, an engineering estimate for the interoperability work stands at roughly a year to 15 months. The filing does not resolve which of the two calendars the court will adopt.

Geography

Section II.F appears only in Google's version. It states that the timelines in the mandated relief apply to the United States and that each element would also be implemented abroad by a time "not to exceed 24 months after the Effective Date", extendable where needed to comply with local law, including contractual notice rules and regimes on data sharing, privacy and competition. The framing is notable because the court's opinion, according to its text, concluded that the markets are worldwide, that the judgment would apply globally, and that worldwide application would be easier to administer and monitor. The plaintiffs omit Google's subsection. Their definition of Google also reaches subsidiaries, affiliates and joint ventures outside the United States, which Google's version deletes.

Equivalence wording

Section V.C is where functional equivalence receives operational definition. AdX must respond to requests from rival ad servers or Prebid "in a functionally equivalent manner and on materially identical" terms as it does for requests from DFP. Four sub-clauses follow: no throttling, no higher revenue share or fee, no deliberately added latency and no deliberately reduced information in bid responses.

The brackets sit on small words with large consequences. Google adds "commercial" before "terms", narrowing the parity standard. The plaintiffs would also bar AdX from altering the value or price of a bid on the basis of the request path; Google would limit the throttling ban to cases where the path is the sole reason. A third difference concerns privacy carve-outs. Both sides accept that Google need not pass information it is barred from passing under its internal privacy policies or governing law. The plaintiffs would forbid applying or changing those policies in a way "that circumvents or frustrates" the obligations, an effects-based test, while Google proposes "designed to circumvent or frustrate", an intent-based one. The same pair of formulations recurs in Sections V.D, V.F and VI.F.

Google also inserts language in V.D conceding parity only "insofar as technically possible", given that DFP runs on different infrastructure from Prebid Server.

What DFP passes to rivals

Section V.F covers the information DFP sends to non-Google exchanges and Prebid instances. The plaintiffs list pricing information, including line-item and temporary pricing and the pacing of direct-sold campaigns, along with Google audience data that DFP shares with AdX. Google's list is shorter: DFP pricing rules, publisher audience data and deal information. Section VI.D, present only in the plaintiffs' version, would require non-discriminatory use of cookie identifiers, user identifiers, user location, device identifiers and URL data derived from owning DFP and the DoubleClick domain. Google instead points to its own proposals in V.C, V.D, V.F and VI.F.

Data portability and transparency

Publishers would be able to export DFP data free of charge, but the trigger differs. The plaintiffs frame it around a publisher that is "considering or evaluating" a non-Google ad server; Google limits it to one that has chosen to use one. The definition of Publisher Historical Data diverges as well. The plaintiffs list bid-level fields, including deal type, price, rejection reason, seller reserve price, source type, country, key part, optimization type and timestamps, and want a persistent identifier per impression, unhashed and untruncated. Google restricts the data to what it already maintains and exposes through Ad Manager interfaces. On the auction data file, the plaintiffs want daily or more frequent delivery and pacing information included; Google proposes that the parties work out the format with the monitor and technical committee.

Section VI.B bars Google Ads from prioritizing AdX or DFP publishers in how it bids, absent express advertiser instructions, but permits prioritization to improve advertiser return. Google appends a parenthetical list of qualifying reasons, such as better information, higher-quality impressions, lower latency and fraud protection. The plaintiffs require that the advertiser expressly asked for such prioritization, that the justification be reasonable, supported and verifiable, and that the monitor weigh data from independent, non-Google parties.

Monitor, compliance and enforcement

The structure is shared: a monitor chosen from a slate of three, a technical committee of three, a work plan within 45 days of appointment, quarterly reports and a 90-day status report after the Effective Date. Who proposes and who selects is reversed between the versions. The plaintiffs would put forward the slate and let Google choose; Google would propose and let the plaintiffs choose. The plaintiffs add qualifying experience as a judicial officer, mediator, arbitrator or antitrust lawyer.

On cooperation, the plaintiffs require Google to "cooperate fully with" the monitor and give "full and complete access" within 14 days to personnel, records, source code and facilities. Google's wording is to "take no action to interfere with or impede" the monitor and to provide "reasonable assistance". The plaintiffs' list of powers includes compelling written answers to interrogatories and inspecting source code and algorithms; Google's list allows obtaining reasonable access.

Payment is the sharpest line. The plaintiffs add that a failure to pay the monitor, or to meet a monitor's deadline, is itself a violation that can bring sanctions, and they define Malfeasance as "conduct wholly outside the bounds of the law or reasonable disagreement" - the only ground on which Google could object to compensating the monitor for work already done. Google omits those subsections as unnecessary. The definition concerns the monitor's conduct, not Google's.

Compliance machinery differs too. The plaintiffs would have an officer, director or executive serve as internal compliance officer, subject to their written approval, distribute the judgment to all officers and employees and collect annual certifications that acknowledge contempt exposure. Google's version names an employee and limits distribution to eight roles, among them the chief executive, chief legal officer and the vice presidents responsible for ads and display advertising. The plaintiffs would also require affidavits from the chief financial officer and general counsel every 30 days until the monitor signs an agreement, where Google proposes status reports from the compliance officer.

The tail sections are one-sided. Section XII, plaintiffs only, would let the court hold Google in contempt of provisions "stated specifically and in reasonable detail" even if not unambiguous, allow an extension of the judgment after a violation, shift enforcement costs to Google, and allow a new action for four years after expiry. Section XIII reserves other claims. Google omits both.

What the opinion had already said

Because the order barred argument, the filing does not explain why either side kept its version. The memorandum opinion offers partial guidance. According to the opinion, the court found the plaintiffs' approach to Google's right to object to monitor actions unreasonable and said it would give Google a broad right to object, with a warning that abuse could lead to restriction. It described the proposed anti-discrimination provisions as too indefinite and said indefinite terms would be excised, citing the lack of compliance mechanisms and privacy carve-outs. It found an internal compliance officer appropriate but with narrower duties, rejected "sole discretion" language for the United States, and required the 90-day status report. The October 2 text still carries the plaintiffs' Malfeasance regime and their non-discrimination clause in brackets. Whether these are placeholders pending a ruling or positions maintained for argument is not stated.

Why the numbers matter to buyers and sellers

The findings that produced these clauses carry large figures. According to the memorandum opinion, which restates the liability record, Google held 91% of the worldwide publisher ad server market for open-web display in 2022, and AdX handled 63% to 71% of worldwide open-web display transactions among exchanges that produced data between 2018 and 2022. The opinion also cites a 20% take rate on AdX, compared with a next-largest competitor holding 6% of the exchange market.

Against that backdrop, the gap between a half-year and a full year is practical rather than symbolic. Section V.A and V.B decide when Google's advertiser demand can reach publishers through Prebid and through rival ad servers, which in turn bears on rival exchanges' access to the demand Google Ads controls. The sub-clauses on revenue share, latency and information passed will determine whether a Prebid-routed request is treated as equivalent in measurable terms. Section V.I adds a further control for publishers, who could choose between direct and Prebid routing for an impression but not both, with DFP logs required to show which path was used.

For demand-side buyers the picture is mixed. Google Ads would route through AdX or Prebid rather than bidding directly into DFP, but DV360 sits outside the judgment altogether, a point PPC Land noted in its reading of the full opinion. And because the definition of open-web display leaves out apps, connected television, social platforms and search, the text addresses a slice of Google's advertising business rather than the whole. A tally by publisher adviser Chris Messer, reviewed by PPC Land, found that 19 provisions Google itself had drafted were adopted by the court, 16 as written and three with modifications, alongside six the court added. The October 2 filing is the first document in which the numbers behind those provisions appear in a single draft, though still in two voices.

No judgment has been entered. The CourtListener index showed no later docket entry than Document 1861 as of October 5, 2026, and neither the court nor the parties have published a date for ruling on the bracketed provisions. The 60-day clock to the Effective Date, and the six-year term behind it, start only on entry.

Timeline

  • January 24, 2023: The United States and the first group of states file the ad tech complaint in the Eastern District of Virginia.
  • September 2024: Bench trial on liability.
  • April 17, 2025: The court finds Google liable for monopolizing the publisher ad server and ad exchange markets for open-web display and for unlawful tying.
  • September 2025: Bench trial on remedies.
  • November 3, 2025: The plaintiffs and Google file final post-trial briefs and competing remedy proposals.
  • November 21, 2025: Closing arguments end with doubts voiced about an AdX sale.
  • September 2, 2026: A two-page order rejects divestiture of AdX, open-sourcing of DFP's auction logic and a contingent divestiture of the rest of DFP; the 106-page opinion is filed under seal.
  • September 16, 2026: The memorandum opinion is unsealed.
  • October 2, 2026: The proposed final judgment is docketed as Document 1861, with disputed provisions in bracketed alternative versions.

Summary

Who: The United States, 17 state plaintiffs and Google LLC, before Judge Leonie M. Brinkema of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

What: A 41-page proposed final judgment that sets out agreed and disputed remedies for Google's ad tech business, covering Prebid and rival ad server interoperability, data portability, bidding rules for Google Ads, a monitor, a technical committee and enforcement.

When: Docketed on October 2, 2026, 30 days after the September 2, 2026 order; the judgment would take effect 60 days after entry and run six years.

Where: Case No. 1:23-cv-00108-LMB-JFA, Alexandria Division; Google's wording would phase in outside the United States over up to two years, while the plaintiffs want worldwide application from the Effective Date.

Why: The September 2 order required the parties to turn the court's decisions into an enforceable text and to label unresolved provisions by proponent, which produced a document where the judge still has to choose between competing versions.