Separately, the House Judiciary Committee announced its own investigation into "competition in digital markets," saying: "A small number of dominant, unregulated platforms have extraordinary power over commerce, communication, and information online."
The moves comes amid a rising "techlash" stemming from privacy and data protection lapses at tech firms, and growing concerns about the sheer dominance of these firms.
Politicians on both sides of the political aisle have been stepping up criticism, and some presidential candidates have called for the biggest firms to be broken up.
Analysts say the political winds have shifted against Silicon Valley firms, which had been among the most admired US companies, following revelations on how much personal data they are scooping up.
"Google knows just about everything there is to know about us," said Jack Gold, analyst at the consultancy J. Gold Associates.
Gold said Google and Facebook, the dominant players in online advertising, have developed sophisticated tools to gather data on users.
"It gives them a leg up," Gold said. "They can target ads much better than anyone else. The question is whether there is anybody who can compete with them."
Sound and fury
But some legal scholars say antitrust enforcers will face an uphill battle in taking on Big Tech.
Under most legal interpretations, the government will need to show tech firms abused their monopoly position and harmed consumers—a difficult task with respect to Google and Facebook, which offer most services for free.
"I see this as a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing," said Larry Downes, project director at Georgetown University's Center for Business and Public Policy.
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