Google sued by biz directory
Antitrust claim
Posted in Law, 18th February 2009 13:23 GMT
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A business directory site is suing Google for allegedly unfairly raising prices and favouring a rival firm.
SourceTool.com claims to the internet's only business to business search engine.
It makes money by bidding for Google keywords. When surfers click through to SourceTool the site makes money by displaying Google AdWords.
But after a few months in business Google decided to up the prices it was charging SourceTool for keywords.
When company owner Dan Savage asked Google why he was told that its systems had judged his landing page to be of low quality, the New York Times reports. Because of this Savage would have to pay more to rank highly on Google's results page.
Savage believes Google upped prices because it saw his business as a potential competitor. He also claims the search giant has an anticompetitive deal with business.com - which runs a similar business directory.
Savage complained to the Justice Department when it was considering Google's bid for Yahoo!.
Google said it had not yet reviewed the complaint in detail. ®
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