Google Sued Over Deceptive Search Results

biggles266 writes "Internet goliath Google claims to rank search results by relevance, but the search engine engages in deceptive conduct by selling off the top positions to commercial partners, a Sydney court has heard. The Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) is taking world-first legal action in the Federal Court against Google Inc over allegedly deceptive conduct related to sponsored links on its websites. The ACCC has brought a two-pronged case against Trading Post and Google — including subsidiaries Google Australia and Google Ireland — for potentially misleading consumers. The consumer watchdog alleges Google does not do enough to differentiate "organic" search results — those ranked by relevance — from sponsored links which appear at the top of the results page."

Comments

Flash Ads only

[Herkum01]

Obviously the consumer cannot tell the difference because it is not a "Flash" ad moving wildly across the screen saying "Spank the Monkey, Spank the Monkey!"

I guess using Google does not qualify your ability to understand the search results.

Re:Tag

[gEvil (beta)]

Seriously, is suing google the newest business model in the US?

Did Australia become part of the US when Bush was down there last week?

Re:What, the "Sponsered Links" section?

[MyLongNickName]

"sponsered links"

Ahhh! Now I see the problem. Google misspelled "sponsored". You'd think they could afford a spell checker.

Re:Facist Australia

[owlstead]

That's "fascist Australia", you insensitive clod.