Texas’ Attorney General has Opened an Antitrust Investigation for Google (GOOG)

September 3, 2010, 5:14 PM

Google Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG)is under review by Texas’ attorney general in an antitrust investigation that was prompted by complaints that the company has abused its power as a search engine to recommend website.

Google announced on Friday that Texas’s Attorney General has opened an antitrust inquiry about allegations that Google unfairly lowered rankings on the search engine for several small companies in the location of their advertisements.

Texas Attorney General spokesman Greg Abbott would only confirm the investigation, but declined any further comments.

Order of the search engine results can have a huge affect on whether a company succeeds since Google owns the search engine market, compensating for approximately two thirds of internet search requests. The Attorney General seems to put its focus on whether Google is manipulating its search engine results to decrease its competition.

European regulators have also began  investigating complaints in similar matters. There have been several lawsuits filed in the U.S. that have alleged Google’s search engine is abusing its power with its rankings. Google said that Texas’s state attorney general is the first to open an antitrust review.

Don Harrison, Google’s deputy general counsel, said on a blog Friday .”We look forward to answering (Abbott’s) questions because we’re confident that Google operates in the best interests of our users,”

“Given that not every website can be at the top of the results, or even appear on the first page of our results, it’s unsurprising that some less relevant, lower quality websites will be unhappy with their ranking,” Harrison also included.

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