Yahoo, said to be Number One on the China censor list, is being sued for allegedly paying to have its ads come up when JP Enterprises' LoveCity.com site is keyed into the Google search page.

JP Enterprises is accusing Yahoo, HDVE LLC, Spark Networks and Insight Direct USA of, "unfair competition and trademark dilution and infringement. It seeks to recover damages and punitive damages," says ZDNet News.

The lawsuit says Yahoo and the others, "inserted metatags containing the words 'lovecity' and variations on that name as keywords into Google's AdWords paid search advertising system".

In a related case involving real estate companies, Google won a lawsuit filed that alleged its search ad business, "encourages unlawful use of trademarks, but other cases are pending against the search giant," says the story.

"Yahoo runs its own online personals service, as do at least two of the other companies named in the lawsuit - HDVE, which operates True.com, and Spark Networks, which runs a host of Internet dating services including AmericanSingles.com and JDate.com," says Online Media Daily, adding:

"Little information was immediately available about the role of the third company sued, Insight Direct USA.

"Spokespeople from Yahoo and Spark Networks declined to comment, while Insight Direct and True.com didn't return telephone calls."

Also See:
China censor list - Yahoo Number 1 Net Censor, June 17, 2006
ZDNet News - Trademark infringement suit hits search again, June 16, 2006
Online Media Daily - Yahoo Sued For Buying Keywords On Google, June 16, 2006