According to a recent press release, the giant search engine Microsoft has been selling online ads to criminal gangs. These people run pharmaceutical web sites in which they offer medication without a proper prescription.

Most search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft require pharmacy sites that pay for advertising to be first verified by a company known as PharmacyChecker before selling online ads.

However, Microsoft failed in the process of confirming that the online ads sold to these pharmacies were taking Microsoft’s users to pharmacies that were selling drugs without a proper prescription.

Microsoft commented:”We take these claims very seriously and are currently investigating this issue.”

The online industry continues to see drops during this second quarter of 2009 and it’s likely to keep dropping.

The economic downturn on online ad spending is affecting major business from the online industry and major publishers are speculating about the future of the industry.

The worldwide market dropped 5% during the second quarter of 2009 in comparison to the second quarter of 2008. In the United States, the online ad spending in the second quarter of 2009 went down 7%.

Since February 2009 it’s been a rumor that Goolge Radio would be sold to the software firm WideOrbit; however, nobody from the two parties confirmed the sale. In July, there was still a rumor that Google was going to close the deal.

A recent press release confirmed that WideOrbit has acquired the internet search and advertising giant’s online radio, Google Radio. The online ad and media management software firm WideOrbit bought Google Radio for an undisclosed sum.

As it was expected, WideOrbit will take over Google’s radio business, a company that’s back by at lest $34.5 million in venture capital.