Google takes Microsoft to court over anti trust claims

Google takes Microsoft to court over anti trust claims

Google and Microsoft have got into yet another legal battle against each other after the search engine giant alleged that Microsoft's newest operating system version, Microsoft Vista is against the company's antitrust settlement.

According to a report published in the Wall Street Journal, Google has sent a white paper to the Justice Department and state attorneys general in which it states that Vista makes it very difficult for users to install desktop-search tools developed by companies other than Microsoft.

Google alleges that since Microsoft has included its own desktop-search tool in Vista, the company is looking to force users make use of Windows' own search function since system performance falls down if users try to install a second desktop-search application, such as Google's own Desktop Search.

A Google spokesman said that Microsoft is violating an agreement it had made back in 2002, in which the company had promised to promote fair play. "Microsoft's current approach with Vista desktop search violates the consent decree and limits consumer choice", the spokesman said.

However Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft in Kirkland, Washington, believes that the onus is on Google to prove its allegations. Helm said that as long as Vista allows other applications to run on the system, there is no way that it can be found of breaching anti trust rules.

"Google seems to be alleging that if two pieces of software don't play together, then it must be an anticompetitive tactic of Microsoft's. I don't recall any past antitrust cases asserting something so broad", he said.