Google Sent to Court By the Government

A new important case was announced today by the Australian Government's watchdog, The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission that sued Google Inc, Google Australia and Google Ireland for "misleading and deceptive conduct in relation to sponsored links that appeared on the Google website." Basically, the Mountain View company is sued because several adverts of "Kloster Ford" and "Charlestown Toyota", car dealerships and rivals with the Trading Post, were displayed in the sponsored links category on the search engine results page.

"The ACCC is also alleging that Google, by causing the Kloster Ford and Charlestown Toyota links to be published on its website, engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct in breach of section 52 of the Act. Further, the ACCC is alleging that Google, by failing to adequately distinguish sponsored links from "organic" search results, has engaged and continues to engage in misleading and deceptive conduct in breach of section 52 of the Act," the official complaint issued by the ACCC reads.

The Mountain View company representatives said that this lawsuit affects all search engines on the Internet because some of the companies might not be allowed to advertise using the Google technology anymore.

"Google Australia believes that these claims are without merit and we will defend against them vigorously. They represent an attack on all search engines and the Australian businesses, large and small, who use them to connect with customers throughout the world," Google Australia spokesperson Rob Shilkin said for News.com.au. "It's very unfortunate that the ACCC has decided to pursue a litigious strategy against one participant, rather than consulting more broadly on an issue that affects the entire industry," Internet Industry Association chief executive Peter Coroneos added.

This is quite the first time when Google is sent to the court for accusations concerning the sponsored link and the case involves the government of the country.