Google has been sued by a New York politician claiming that Google intentionally provides and promotes – indeed that Google’s business plan includes – child pornography.
The lawsuit, filed by Nassau County Democrat Jeffrey Toback, in the New York Supreme Court (don’t let that wow you – counter-intuitively, the Supreme Court in New York is actually the lowest court in New York’s system – it’s the trial court where all initial lawsuits are filed), claims, among other things, that Google is profiting to the tune of billions of dollars a year by allowing operators of child pornography sites, and providers of “other obscene content” to be located through Google’s search engine, and to advertise their sites and on their sites through Google’s popular AdWords and AdSense programs.
Google, says Toback, “continues to put its economic gains ahead of the interests and well-being of America’s children.”
The complaint goes on to say that Google “is willing to accede to the demands of the Chinese autocrats to block the search term “democracy”, but when it comes to the protection and well-being of our nation’s innocent children, Defendant refuses to spend a dime’s worth of resources to block child pornography from reaching children.”
Of course, Toback admits to being “not the most computer-literate guy”, and also admits that until 3 days ago (after the suit was filed) he didn’t realize that Google has a “SafeSearch” option, which filters out adult material.
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But more to the point, Toback apparently didn’t realize that Google fairly zealously fails to display ads either about or on any site which even hints at child pornography, and that if any site which deals in child porn comes to their attention, it is immediately removed from any Google listings and products.
Explained a Google spokesperson, “Child pornography is illegal, and Google prohibits it in our products. When we find or are made aware of any child pornography, we remove it from our products, including our search engine. We also report it to the appropriate law enforcement officials and fully cooperate with the law enforcement community to combat child pornography.”
Of course, hey, why let the facts get in the way of a good lawsuit?
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Google says they remove sites from their listings that exploit children, but it’s not true. I called to report a listing and they said “they did not list sites, their robots do.” Pretty disgusting.
Sure sounds as if Mr. Toback is up for re-election, and in desperate shape in the polls!