Google rep denies using AI for live Senate responses, dodges market dominance claims

In a heated Senate committee hearing, lawmakers questioned technology giant Google about the company’s market dominance in search and AI — and whether they used AI assistants when answering questions in the hearing itself.

Google, Amazon, and Microsoft representatives appeared before the Select Committee on Adopting Artificial Intelligence on Friday.

Midway through the session, an audible interruption from what sounded like Google Assistant prompted Independent Senator David Pocock to probe whether a Google representative was leveraging AI tools to help answer the committee’s questions.

“Can I ask what interrupted you earlier, when you were talking and we heard a voice? Is AI helping you on this call? Have you got a screen there that’s helping with answers?” Pocock asked.

Lucinda Longcroft, Google’s director of Government Affairs & Public Policy for Australia and New Zealand, said that was not the case.

“I do wish we had an AI screen for that purpose,” Longcroft said.

“AI is built into all of Google’s products, whether you’re doing Maps, or completing search, or helping you with drafting your emails.

“Our Google Assistant and products on the Google Pixel [phones], which we enjoy using here in Google, are responsive to prompts.

“So it’s just listening in to this conversation and prompting.

“I’ve enabled it to assist me, but I can assure you that it’s not helping with the answers to these questions.”

Later in the session, Senator Pocock followed up to confirm whether AI had played a role in gathering information for answers provided during the hearing.

“I just wanted to confirm after my earlier question about that noise we heard — you haven’t had any assistance from AI in gathering information to answer these questions?” Pocock asked.

Longcraft responded by saying this was an interesting question.

“AI is embedded in all of Google’s tools, whether it’s search or maps or Assistant or others, and so it is helping us, and all Australians that use our products and services every day in finding information,” Longcroft said.

Later, Pocock asked about the extensive list of regulatory, legal, and academic advisory groups that Google engages with, which Longcroft had previously mentioned during the hearing.

“Your last answer was an incredibly extensive list of groups that you engage with… was that just off the top of your head?” Pocock asked.

“It is. It’s part of our bread and butter, Senator,” Longcroft said.

“We work with those regulators on a daily basis.

“The team I work with here in Australia, and over 20,000 trust and safety people around the world that we have engaged, are working with that level of regulatory scrutiny, oversight and collaboration.

“We have a mutual goal of ensuring trust, reliability, and preventing harm to users here in Australia and elsewhere.”

Google refuses to admit search dominance

Elsewhere during the inquiry, Senator Tony Sheldon questioned Google about the Australian search market.

Senator Sheldon raised the issue of a US Federal Court ruling Google’s search dominance is an illegal monopoly this week.

“Now, publishers are saying Google is using its market power similarly in AI — their websites are disappearing from Google search, and they refuse to block AI from scraping their content,” Senator Sheldon said.

“Would Google agree that it’s a monopoly in search and in AI in Australia? Would Google agree that it’s a monopoly in search and monopoly in search in Australia as well?”

According to Longcraft, Google will be appealing the US ruling, referring to its search engine as “popular” in what it calls a highly competitive environment.

Senator Sheldon sought further clarity on this point.

“Isn’t it dominant, though? You can say the word. It’s okay,” Senator Sheldon said.

Longcraft continued to dodge this language and refuted this description of Google search.

“We don’t agree with that framing of our product… the search market in Australia is diverse,” Longcraft said.

Senator Sheldon went on to ask what size of the market Google had in Australia, and whether the company has the most prominently used search engine in the Australian market.

According to Longcroft, Google is just one of the “many ways” people search for information, pointing to how people might also go to Amazon to search for shoes.

“I’ve already said that certainly the Federal Court in the US has found that your dominance is illegal, and you’re still avoiding answering the question,” Senator Sheldon said.

“I highly note that, it’s extremely disappointing.”

He followed by questioning Google on what it was doing to ensure it didn’t abuse market power when it came to AI in Australia.

In response, Longcraft pointed to Google’s investment into the local AI ecosystem and its engagement with the startup community,

Questioning returned to Senator David Pocock, who also took issue with Google referring to search as simply “popular”.

“For a market that clearly you are miles ahead of everyone else in terms of market share, you’re trying to tell us it’s not a monopoly?” he said.

“From the stats I can see, 93.97% of searches in Australia go through Google. The next is Bing at 4.45%.”

“Why this aversion from Google in just acknowledging what is a plain fact — that you have a huge, huge market share of search in Australia? Saying that people search information in very different ways doesn’t seem to cut it if 94% of searches are through Google,” Senator Pocock continued.

Longcroft acknowledged the statistic as a fact, but maintained that it “only reflects the portion of the way in which Australians search for information online”.

“It is a highly dynamic and competitive environment, as it is in the field of AI, where there is intense competition at every stage or layer of the AI value chain. We relish that competition,” Longcroft said.

Google wasn’t the only big tech company to cop a grilling during the Senate inquiry.

Earlier in the day, Amazon was questioned over its use of AI in the US to monitor employees in fulfilment centres. It also touched on charges filed by workers alleging the use of the technology for union busting. According to the company, Amazon isn’t using AI in Australia for worker monitoring.

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