According to new numbers from a global search survey conducted by comScore, Google is the most popular search engine in the world. In fact, Google handles roughly 60% of world wide search. (37 billion) That number is even higher than the 50% of searches it handles here in the United States. The study looked at global numbers for other engines as well and listed Yahoo (8.5 billion), Baidu (3.3 billion), Microsoft (2.2 billion) and NHN (2 billion) as rounding out the top five.

The Associated Press has the full story, including some questions on the accuracy of the survey.

The worldwide totals were calculated using measurements from 2 million Internet users in some 170 countries. Participants agree to install tracking software and are often enticed by free products and services like screensavers, games and online backup.

ComScore also has a smaller panel recruited using traditional, phone-based methods, and the search figures are adjusted to account for differences in age, income and other factors between the panels. ComScore, like Nielsen, says it needs online techniques to assemble a large enough, albeit self-selected panel.

With Internet users more fragmented than the television audience, Ivins said, “I don’t think you can do what we’re doing on a scale we’re doing with a toolkit from the last century.”

Many traditional pollsters are skeptical.

Such an approach assumes that those who initiate participation, such as responding to a free offer, behave similarly to those who do not — an assumption that still needs more research to prove, said Nancy A. Mathiowetz, president of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.

Either way, it’s a fairly safe guess to use the data to show Google as being the dominant player in worldwide search. After all, even if you cut their numbers in half, they’re still way ahead of the competition.

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