Bangalore: It seems like Google is having a hard time defending itself and that’s why it has decided to spend a lot of money in attempts to influence the decisions made. Indeed it has already spent a record $5 million on lobbying for the first three months this year. The interesting fact is the number is higher than Apple, Microsoft and Facebook combined together.

Microsoft was the highest spender on lobbying till mid of last year. The amount  that Google spent in the first three months of 2012 is approximately 240 percent higher than what it used up in the same period last year and it doesn’t seem to come down as the Mountain View, California based company is still hiring extra lobbyists to defend the investigations regarding anti-trust practices and privacy issues.

Google is currently undergoing one of the biggest antitrust investigations by Federal Trade Commission, accusing the company of manipulating the Search Engine Result pages to its advantage. It is also facing a suit over stolen Java codes that powered its Android.  The company was fined $25,000 last week by Federal Communications Commission for purposefully hindering investigations against Google’s street cars for collecting “unencrypted data from open wireless networks.”

Google, the preacher of “Open Ecosystem,” which aims to make the data universally available has hired former Congresswoman Susan Molinari as the chief of its Washington, DC office for its efforts to lobby on the congress and connect with U.S. and other governments regarding the Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA), Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) and so on.  

Google is also actively lobbying Congress on lot other issues including copyright, patents, online advertising, cyber security, online privacy and “do-not-track” laws and high-tech education and immigration.