Google-Gov’t Impasse Resolved: Well, For Now

By:Joseph Pratt

The issue of Internet privacy rights in America has been a hot topic of late. The latest flashpoint was a showdown in San Jose, CA pitting the Department of Justice against the giant search engine Google. Essentially, the Department of Justice wants to rewrite and make constitutionally viable the federal Child Online Protection Act of 1998, which was overturned on constitutional grounds in 2004.

A common misconception is that this whole brouhaha stems from a governmental crackdown on child pornography. It isn’t. It’s instead a measure designed to curtail the easy access of material considered “adult” to minors through the Internet. Loosely speaking, this federal act takes search engines to task, at least partially, in shielding kids from pornographic and objectionable material. Search engines, like Google, maintain that it’s not their job to police information, but the users. The major search engines, in sympathy with what’s socially acceptable, employ standard search filters which must be disabled before making searches for raunchy material.

Google initially acted in non-compliance with a subpoena, issued in August 2005, to turn over all requests from Google’s search engine from a sample one-week period and one million randomly chosen websites from Google’s databases - a massive amount of data.
This week US District Judge James Ware indicated that he would require Google to turn over some, but not nearly all, of the data that the Department of Justice has been seeking from them. The judge relayed to all parties that privacy concerns of the individual, Google’s stated worry, will be of paramount importance in any data transfer. The government’s position has remained the data is not to be used for personal reference.
The quick ruling, this day in court was about two months in the waiting, is seen as a move to take some of the intensity of the confrontation. Further, Judge Ware stated his intention to issue his written ruling quickly. All told, this doesn’t have the makings of a dramatic, marathon court case, not here and not now, anyway.
“At a minimum we've come a long way from the initial subpoena request, which was for billions of URLs and an entire week's worth of search queries. When the government was asked to justify their demand they conceded that they needed much less. Now the government has on its own already reduced that to 50,000 URLs and 5,000 search queries as a result of this process." – Google’s legal Counsel, Nicole Wong

1) I admire the attempts at spin (as did the stock market on the afternoon of 3/14) but US District Judge James Ware ruled in favor of the government. Google will be required to turn over search records to the government. The government lawyers claim they need this data to study how often pornographic material pops up in search.

2) The government’s original demands will be significantly curtailed, and this is something of a win for Google. Instead of “billions” (Did she really mean billions?) of URLs they’ll be receiving 50,000. I think the pressure cooker loses some steam in what could effectively serve as a compromise in averting more stand off. With much less to hand over, Google might look petty if they don’t cooperate now. Don’t forget AOL, Yahoo!,Ask,com, and MSN.com have already complied. All these companies maintain that no personal information was divulged – that would be a p.r. disaster.

3) While Ms. Wong wasn’t exuberant, I believe there is sentiment from Google that their proprietary search process will not be threatened by this subpoena. Perhaps, this is why Wall Street reacted with some relief.

I took an informal opinion poll among the staffers at ICMediaDirect.com and most think that both sides have come across okay this week. You’ve got to pick your fights wisely and neither side seems to want to drag this out any further than it has been already. The federal government would have looked like bullies by asking for so much potentially sensitive material from the leader in search. On the other hand, Google risked looking arrogant in not cooperating with their government, in a case concerning the welfare of children, no less (and likely not coincidentally). No matter. It looks like cooler heads prevailed and a battle has been averted.

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Article keywords: Child Online Protection Act, US District Judge James Ware, Internet privacy rights

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