DOJ Rebukes Google Privacy Concerns

The U.S. Department of Justice said in a court filing Friday that Google's privacy concerns are unwarranted, claiming its request to cull through search result queries would not be traceable to specific users. The DOJ was responding to Google's assertion that the subpoena would reveal confidential information.

The federal government is asking for the information in order to fight the blocking of an online child protection law by the U.S. Supreme Court. Internet filters are not good enough to prevent minors from viewing inappropriate material online, Justice Department lawyers said in the 18-page brief.

Google has been blocking the government's attempts to obtain data since last summer, when it received a subpoena asking it to comply. The DOJ then took the Mountain View, Calif.-based company to court, and a hearing is scheduled for March 13.

To bolster its case, the Justice Department has called on University of California, Berkeley statistics professor Philip Stark, who argued that Google's privacy claims were unfounded.

A request was attached to the subpoena that said user information should be left out, and that the information was to be run through a program that would only look for the data the government was looking for, Stark added.

However, Google disagrees, saying it has built up a feeling of trust with its users that it's not interested in breaking.

"Google users trust that when they enter a search query into a Google search box, not only will they receive back the most relevant results, but that Google will keep private whatever information users communicate absent a compelling reason," the company argued in a recent court filing.

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