The die is cast

Judge Richard Kramer of the California Superior Court has dismissed a lawsuit against Google and Yahoo, which were charged with displaying gambling ads in search results.

The suit was filed in 2004 by two California residents, which saw the ads and alleged they violate California state law. (Online gambling within the state is illegal, so plaintiffs asked the court to interpret the practice of advertising online gambling as illegal.)

One plaintiff purportedly lost $100,000 gambling online. The suit demanded monetary damages.

According to Kramer, search engines are immune from liability under the Communications Decency Act, which protects sites from being accountable for material provided by third parties. Kramer also ruled against an injunction, because both Google and Yahoo have stopped accepting gambling ads in the United States.

Last year Google, Yahoo and Microsoft paid a settlement of $31.5 to the Justice Department for accepting gambling ads.