You might think that using Google is useful and costs you nothing. However, the search giant earns almost $350 billion a year mostly from knowing what you search for online.
You're effectively paying in data to use Google (and any search engine), but our investigation shows that online search is now a messy, inconsistent experience filled with invasive and potentially harmful advertising.
News, deals and stuff the manuals don't tell you.How ads dominate online search
Google has become the world’s librarian, punching the card of billions of web searches every day, and overseeing searches from the benign to life critical. Despite its importance to us, Google can effectively generate daily fortunes off the back of our data with limited interference. For years this felt like a fair deal as we got a powerful ‘free’ service in return, but our research shows that Google’s lustre has faded as our portal to the online world. And none of its competitors offer an obviously better alternative if you do want to try something different.
Google has around 90% control over the UK search engine market. Bing, Microsoft’s search engine, has a tiny 3.94% share. Yahoo Search (1.35%) comes next but most of its search and ads are provided by Bing. The privacy-focused DuckDuckGo (0.56%) is a far distant competitor (it does its own search but Bing provides the ads).
On average, just under a fifth (18%) of results we checked on Google were ads. It was inconsistent, though – some results, such as 'cheap televisions 50 inch', had around 30% of results as ads, but others, such as ‘what are the symptoms of the menopause’, had none.
Microsoft’s Bing had the highest proportion of advertising – nearly half (47%) of results on average. It had five advertising rates over 60%. More than two thirds of results were marketing on searches for best air fryers and cheap televisions 50 inch. Yahoo had 33% of results we checked as ads, and DuckDuckGo rated at 16%.
There’s nothing wrong with online advertising, but if ads are going rank highly on searches, they have to justify the position. And some in our test were at best unhelpful, at worse potentially harmful.
From dodgy advice to potential scams
Some ads seen in our testing were bizarrely irrelevant, but others were potentially risky, such as ads plugging whiskey barrel investment opportunities. Others had the potential to at least confuse, including dubious menopause testing kits and drugs. Some could leave you seriously out of pocket, such as suspected scams
whiskey barrel investment opportunityprivate companies offering US visa services6 tips for better online searches
Whatever you’re searching for, it’s always worth being vigilant about dodgy ads, misleading information and possible scams.
Know how to identify ads: What’s the source?: Click with caution: Trust the experts: Be careful what you share: Use an ad blocker:Why greater regulation is needed for online search
While AI services such as ChatGPT could revolutionise how we use online search going forwards, the reality is that Google is likely to dominate for many years to come.
In January, the Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA) used new powers - campaigned for by Which? - to open an investigation into whether to regulate Google search. Which? Is urging the CMA to intervene in the market and use its new powers to improve competition - essential to driving up standards for consumers and businesses alike.
Rocio Concha, Which? Director of Policy and Advocacy, said:'Which? campaigned for the CMA to receive new powers to improve competition in key digital markets, and it’s essential it now uses these to intervene in the UK search market.
'Only with increased competition can we hope to drive up standards across the market and improve the experience for users. As part of this, the CMA should make it easier for consumers to exercise choice over the search engine they use, and allow more control over the collection and use of personal data.'
What the brands told us
We put our findings to the search engines.
Google Microsoft DuckDuckGo YahooHow we tested the search engines
Which? ran 520 online searches, reviewing 5,000 individual results in total from Google, Bing, Yahoo Search and DuckDuckGo. In each case, researchers worked under lab-controlled conditions, and used a default set-up for ‘clean’ results, i.e. not one signed into a Google account or with a browsing history.
All engines were tested on five browser variations - Chrome (PC), Edge, Safari, Chrome (Mac) and Edge (Mac). Researchers selected 20 search questions – half were for products or services like air fryers, cheap TVs and organic dog food. The other half were information searches, such as ‘what is normal for blood pressure’ and ‘how can I earn more on my savings’. Based on industry standard measuring tools, these questions were genuine things people wanted to know, including extremely popular searches, and what’s called ‘long-tail’ searches, which are less popular but still consistently made.
The latter are much more niche and specialised terms, such as ‘Best price on running shoes for flat feet’ or ‘How often should I take 100 mg of tramadol?’. Researchers then analysed the first 10 search results presented to them including what are called ‘organic’ results (websites shown naturally by the search engines based on an algorithm which dictates the relevance to the original query).
The results also included ads and other content boxes, such as shopping carousels (sometimes paid advertising), boxes featuring related questions, snippets quoted from websites and also AI overviews. In addition to the core test on PCs and Macs, researchers ran a cutdown test on iOS and Android smartphones involving six questions and analysing eight results on each run.
source https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/google-users-hit-with-dubious-ads-tips-for-better-online-searches-alC8f0u8L1si