Google's search results appear to be biased in favor of its shopping results and other services, and Google's own services always seem to appear near the top of its organic search results, said Senator Mike Lee, a Utah Republican.

Lee referred to a chart showing Google's shopping results consistently in the top three search results, while other comparison shopping sites moved up and down in Google rankings. It appears that Google has "cooked" its search results, he said.

Schmidt denied the assertions of Lee and other subcommittee members. "I can assure you, we haven't cooked anything," he said. Google is focused on delivering the best search results, not driving business to its services, he said.

Lee's chart appeared to be comparing searches for products with searches for price comparison sites, Schmidt said. "I'm not aware of any unnecessary or strange boosts or biases" favoring Google products, he said.

That answer didn't satisfy Senator Al Franken, a Minnesota Democrat. Schmidt's answer to Lee, saying he wasn't aware of any search bias in shopping services was "fuzzy," Franken said. "If you don't know, who does?" he added.