Senator Kohl: Need Oversight of a Goo-Hoo Partnership

Senate Antitrust subcommittee chairman Herb Kohl is urging the Justice Department to monitor and take action against Google down the road even if its ad-sharing deal with Yahoo passes initial muster.

While he did not object to the deal outright Kohl wrote a letter to Congress yesterday urging the Justice department to take action again "if, over time, you determine that Google is gaining a dominant market position as a result of the Google-Yahoo agreement."

"Should the amount of advertising outsourced by Yahoo to Google grow significantly, we believe the threat to competition will also increase."

The DoJ is expected to make a decision on Google's plan to serve ads on Yahoo sites by the end of next week, but it is still unclear how the department will act. The letter intimates that the antitrust division is leaning toward approving the agreement, but modifications and continued scrutiny may provide some major headaches for Google and Yahoo moving forward.

Sen. Kohl asks for continued Google, Yahoo monitoring [Reuters]

by Meghan Keane for Wired.com

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