(ECNS) -- China's Internet giant Baidu Inc has denied a report stating it played a key role in secretly highlighting gambling websites in search results at midnight each day, instead calling on police for help, according to a Beijing News report.
Gambling websites mostly showed up between 10 pm and 9 am on Baidu.com thanks to embezzled operating licenses and qualification certificates for legal businesses, it was said. Some have even been labeled "business operations", one of Baidu Inc's website promotion services.
Liu Ming, an employee at Baidu, who reported the situation to the company and Beijing Consumer Association, said some agents paid commission fees to salesmen in the search company's online marketing department to promote faked and illegal business information, including gambling.
Fees from promoting online gambling websites can hit 300,000 yuan ($44,800) per night, Liu said.
Tao Yang, an ordinary wage-earner in Changsha, Hunan Province found online gambling websites such as The Venetian through Baidu.com, becoming subsequently addicted and losing over 200,000 yuan in the process, the report confirmed.
The number of people betting via The Venetian can range from 470,000 to 620,000 a night, with revenuse reaching 100 million yuan, it was added.
Baidu responded by saying all gambling websites that appeared in search engine results were due to illegal actions taken by some companies that covertly manipulated information.
It added that incidents have been reported to police and that it is collecting envidence to support investigations.
The serarch engine promised to increase check-ups into illegal hyperlinks.
