YNOT – The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has ended a two-year antitrust investigation into Google’s operations, concluding the search giant violated no U.S. statutes with the way it organizes and presents search results. The decision, touted as a major victory for Google, spares the company what might have become the same kind of expensive, protracted legal battle that not only reined in Microsoft’s desktop dominance in the 1990s but also badly damaged the software developer’s reputation and market share.

The decision allows Google to continue presenting search results in a way that highlights its own services over those of competitors. The investigation was commenced after complaints by competitors like Expedia, Priceline and Kayak — in addition to a group of rival search engines that banded together to form FairSearch.org — suggested Google’s search policies unfairly restrict trade and put them at a competitive disadvantage. Yelp, a travel reviews website, accused Google of content piracy and plagiarism, saying Google used Yelp’s reviews in search results that link to consumer products owned by Google.

The FTC’s decision could have major implications not only for businesses and rival search engines, but also for consumers. With more than a 70-percent worldwide market share in the search game, Google slowly but surely has branched out into a variety of consumer markets, particularly travel booking, maps and restaurant reviews. Google’s search business brings in billions of dollars annually in advertising; the consumer sites stand to produce billions more, especially as they appear higher on search-results pages than competing sites, whether or not Google’s vaunted “neutral” search algorithm says that’s where they should go.

Google’s dominance in the search market makes it a prime target for accusations of unfair trade practices and bullying. Yelp, for example, alleged that when it complained to Google about Yelp intellectual property being used to promote Google’s travel sites, Google threatened to remove Yelp from search results altogether. That kind of predatory behavior was particularly troubling for the FTC.

The Yelp allegation was “clearly problematic and potentially harmful to competition, because it might harm incentives to innovate,” FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said.

Still, the FTC quieted its objection when Google agreed to discontinue some potentially shady policies relating to advertising. Leibowitz called the agreement “enforceable,” but noted it stopped short of completely curtailing Google’s gunboat diplomacy.

“While not everything Google did was beneficial, on balance we did not believe that the evidence supported an FTC challenge to this aspect of Google’s business under American law,” Leibowitz said.

Though the FTC determined the search giant broke no U.S. laws, several state attorneys general and European regulators continue investigations into Google’s practices.

Contributing writer Stewart Tongue assisted with this report.