Unwilling to accept a court's ruling, 8848, which was earlier ordered by a Beijing court to apologize and pay Baidu.com (BIDU), Sohu.com (SOHU), and Zhongsou.com about CNY1.16 million, has refused to apologize and to compensate the three companies.

8848 has now launched a counter-suit against the three companies.

Baidu and Sohu said they would continue to press the lawsuit with 8848 until they received the compensation.

The lawsuit with 8848 is of high significance now as it will define the nature of 8848's "mysearch" software.

8848's "mysearch" software, which is provided to users as a free download, has caused many of the problems. The software angered Baidu, Sohu and Zhongsou because it helped 8848 add its own search engine onto the three parties' respective search pages so as to attract users away the three parties' own websites.

There is yet no indication exactly what 8848's lawsuit hopes to extract from the three companies.