A federal judge in Washington suggested on Friday he is considering making Alphabet's Google take less aggressive measures to restore competition in online search than the 10-year regime proposed by antitrust enforcers.

US District Judge Amit Mehta heard closing arguments on Friday at a trial on proposals to address Google's illegal monopoly in online search and related advertising.

"Ten years may seem like a short period, but in this space, a lot can change in weeks," he said, citing recent developments such as ChatGPT maker OpenAI buying a device startup.

The DOJ and a coalition of states want Google to share search data and cease multibillion-dollar payments to Apple and other smartphone makers to be the default search engine on new devices.

At the hearing, the judge floated the pos

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