The U.S. Senate opened hearings on a pending Yahoo-Google partnership Tuesday. The Antitrust, Competition and Consumer Rights committee means to put the screws to each party’s legal counsel in an attempt to determine whether the deal violates antitrust laws.

Google is the number-one search site, while Yahoo currently hosts the second most popular site. Ad revenues from searches are a multibillion-dollar market. Lawmakers want to ensure that a deal amidst these giant players won’t jeopardize free competition.

Among those who

testified Tuesday in favor of the deal were Michael Callahan, general counsel for Yahoo, and David Drummond, general counsel for Google. On the opposing side, Microsoft sent Senior Vice President and General Counsel Brad Smith.

The Google-Yahoo Mashup

According to the terms of the proposed deal, Yahoo would share search results with Google. When a visitor enters a search term on the Yahoo site, instead of displaying only Yahoo advertisers, the search […]

Orginal post by Top Tech News