Microsoft in a more ultimate response flatly denied that it was copying Google search results. Senior VP Yusuf Mehdi said bluntly that the company doesn't copy results from any competitors, "full stop," and that any propagation of results was a virtue of the anonymous click stream results many use. Google was not only being hostile but actively deceptive in using spamming techniques to make it look like innocuous data had been maliciously collected.
"For a competitor to accuse any one of these people of such activity is just insulting," Mehdi wrote. "Google engaged in a 'honeypot' attack to trick Bing.
"In simple terms, Google’s 'experiment' was rigged to manipulate Bing search results through a type of attack also known as 'click fraud.' That’s right, the same type of attack employed by spammers on the web to trick consumers and produce bogus search results. What does all this cloak and dagger click fraud prove? Nothing anyone in the industry doesn’t already know... we use click stream optionally provided by consumers in an anonymous fashion as one of 1,000 signals to try and determine whether a site might make sense to be in our index."
The executive went on to raise the stakes and accused Google of copying Bing visual features, travel search and social integration. Microsoft took "no issue" with copying these features. However, he suggested that a major search accuracy update in October last year made Google panic and led it to devise the honeypot sites in hopes of catching Bing copying its behavior. Google was envious that some where "beginning to ask whether Bing is as good or in some cases better" than its own engine, Mehdi argued.
Google hasn't responded to the latest accusations, which not only refute the claims but could be considered libel that accuses it of hostile acts. The earlier search pioneer has so far stood by its official explanation.
