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Well, that didn't take long. Bing, Microsoft's three-year-old search engine, has officially edged out ahead of Yahoo, according to the latest data from ComScore. In December, Yahoo dropped 0.6 percentage points over the previous months, giving Microsoft a slight lead, despite the fact that Bing didn't grow that much during the same time period.

Bing now commands 15.1% of the search market, while Yahoo has dropped to 14.5%. It's not even a full percentage point, but this is the first time Yahoo has been ousted by Microsoft for that #2 slot behind Google.

It's not even three years old yet, but Microsoft's Bing search engine now has about the same share of the market as Yahoo, which has been around since 1995. Bing hit 15% of the search engine market in November, according to ComScore. Yahoo had 15.1%.

Both sites trail far behind Google, which holds onto more than 65% of the market. While that position isn't threatened by any other search engine, it's interesting to note how quickly Bing has risen in the last few years.

In a blog post earlier today, Google announced that SSL-encrypted search will be the default when you're signed-in to your account. The secured channel provides for a more secure and private search experience by protecting search terms and search results from being intercepted by a third party. This is especially important if you're accessing the Internet through a Wi-Fi hotspot at a cafe. This change will roll out over the next few weeks. If you don't have a Google Account, go directly to https://www.google.com.

Last week the Web's three leading search companies - Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! - announced a new structured data collaboration called Schema.org. It includes more than 100 new types of website markup for content like movies, music, organizations, TV shows, products, places and more. The stated aim of Schema.org is to "improve the display of search results, making it easier for people to find the right web pages."

However, is this collaboration routing around existing web standards, as promoted by the governing web body the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)? Since the news was announced, we've discovered that the W3C was not consulted about Schema.org. And given that Google dominates the search market, should we be worried that Google will control a substantial part of the markup used on webpages if - as expected - Schema.org gets significant take-up? Here's why the alarm bell should be rung...

By default, Windows Phone 7 uses Bing as its search engine and Microsoft doesn't currently give users the option to switch to another search provider. Just like Bing launched multiple iPhone apps, though, Google is also bringing its own mobile apps to Windows Phone 7. Just in time for the U.S. launch of Windows Phone 7, you can now download Google Search from the Marketplace.

Since the release of the fourth version of Apple's iOS operating system for the iPhone, Microsoft's Bing can be used as the default search engine on the iPhone. So far, however, Bing has not been able to make major inroads on that device. According to a new study from advertising network Chitika, which recently launched its mobile ad platform, Google continues to dominate search on the iPhone. Almost 97% of searches on the iPhone originate from Google in Safari and the native Google app.

Google just announced that it is rolling out a new beta feature that will allow users to enable Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption when using Google's Web search. Currently, whenever you search on Google, your search data is not encrypted and anybody with enough interest in getting this data can do so by listening in on your connection. Now, Google will use the same encryption methods that banks on e-commerce sites use to prevent others from snooping on your searches as your data moves between your browser and Google's servers.

A little over a week and a half ago, a number of bloggers spotted a new feature in Google search for languages that use non-Latin scripts: virtual keyboards that make typing search queries in these languages easier. Today, Google officially announced that it will make virtual keyboards a default feature on Google search for 35 languages, including Russian, Turkish, Persian, Greek, Thai, Icelandic, Finnish and Swedish.

About a year ago, Google launched real-time search suggestions that were tailored towards users in different countries. Today, Google is taking this one step further and is launching an improved version of Google Suggest that also takes larger metro areas into account. Now, Google Suggest will offer different suggestions for users in New York City and Portland, OR, for example. For the time being, this feature is only available in the U.S.

Apparently Microsoft is talking profit in the midst of 15 straight quarters of losses, according to a Paid Content article this morning. The company is looking to Bing to pull it out of its nearly four-year long slide, Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft senior vice president of online business, said in an interview last night with Reuters.

According to the interview, Bing is looking at becoming a "credible No. 2" as soon as Microsoft closes a deal with Yahoo, making Bing the backbone for Yahoo search. We do see a few areas where Bing has been gaining ground and wonder if Microsoft may be able to come back out of the red.