Consumer watchdog Commercial Alert filed a deceptive advertising complaint
yesterday with the Federal Trade Commission against eight search engines,
for placing ads in search engine results without clear disclosure that the
ads are ads. The complaint states that such listings "look like
information from an objective database selected by an objective algorithm.
 But really they are paid ads in disguise."

Companies named in the complaint include AltaVista Co., AOL Time Warner
Inc., Direct Hit Technologies, iWon Inc., LookSmart Ltd., Microsoft Corp.
and Terra Lycos S.A.

Danny Sullivan has the full story, including commentary on the complaint
and links to more information posted at SearchEngineWatch.com.

Consumer Group Asks FTC To Investigate Search Ads http://searchenginewatch.com/sereport/01/07-ftc.html?source=sday