Judge puts AG's attempt to investigate Google on hold

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The Mississippi attorney general's attempt to investigate Google is on hold for at least four more months.

U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate on Monday granted Google's request for a preliminary injunction, preventing Attorney General Jim Hood from going through with a subpoena meant to examine whether Google is facilitating others' illegal activities on its sites. The injunction will also bar Hood from filing civil or criminal charges for now.

The Internet giant, based in Mountain View, California, argued that Hood's investigation is blocked by a 1996 federal law that says Internet services are immune from lawsuits over what third parties say using the services.

"At this point, Google has the better part of the argument on the reach of the Communications Decency Act of 1996," Wingate said in a ruling read from the bench. He promised a longer written ruling within 10 days.

Wingate, in discussions with lawyers Monday in court, laid out a schedule for each side to seek documents and depose witnesses over 90 days, with arguments on a final ruling in the case to follow this summer.

"The fact that the court has issued an injunction does not mean the court has reached a final decision in the case — just that the court wishes to maintain the status quo," Wingate said.

The showdown between Google and Hood had been building for several years, but it escalated last fall when Hood sent a 79-page subpoena to Google. That document demanded the company produce information on subjects including whether Google is helping criminals by allowing its search engine to lead to pirated music, by having its autocomplete function suggest illegal activities and by sharing YouTube ad revenue with the makers of videos promoting illegal drug sales.

Hood pledged to appeal the injunction, maintaining his position that any dispute over the subpoena belongs in Mississippi state court.

"Google's approach is to try to confuse the issue," Hood, a Democrat, said in a written statement. "This case is not about censorship of the internet or free speech, but whether the attorney general has the authority to determine whether Google has assisted third-party sites in breaking the law. And that is what we intend to do."

Google, though, has argued Hood is infringing on its free speech rights. The Internet giant and its supporters say Hood is part of a covert campaign by movie studios to use legal action to achieve enhanced piracy protection that Congress has rejected. The company says a letter that Hood sent Google that was largely drafted by the Motion Picture Association of America, and notes that former Mississippi Attorney General Mike Moore was hired by the Digital Citizens Alliance, a nonprofit group funded by movie studios and other companies.

Hood's office has said it's only working with people and companies harmed by problems with Google services.

Comments

First Take: Back to the future — Nasdaq 5000 circa 2015

The once-deflated Nasdaq has fully reflated. For the past 15 years, chatter about Nasdaq 5000 was mainly in the past tense, a historical remnant of the dot-com stock bubble era. But today, for the first time since March 2000, the Nasdaq composite — powered by Apple, the world's most valuable company and maker of the iPhone, and a fresh wave of innovation in social media, digital technology and biotech — is back above 5000 and very much alive in the current events debate. Way back when, on March 9, 2000, when the Internet was in diapers and investors were betting that the World Wide Web would be a moneymaking investment of epic proportions, the Nasdaq and its army of newly minted dot-com stocks skyrocketed to its first close above 5000, up an eye-popping 111% from a year earlier. At the time, "Nasdaq 5000" elicited a 1969 "man on the moon"-type awe from investors ranging from Wall Street titans to taxi drivers and hairdressers who viewed "Net stocks...

GOP Bombs On Homeland Security

In a squishy and unsatisfying resolution that funds Homeland Security for a week, the GOP’s internal tensions bubble to the surface once again. It used to be that Congress was broken, and was forced to repeatedly kick the can down the road. Now it seems that Congress can’t even properly kick the can down the road. At a time of alarming national security threats, the House of Representatives brought the nation to the brink of a government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security. On Friday evening, dozens of conservative Republicans revolted against a plan push the deadline back three weeks, joining with Democrats to vote down a simple funding bill to continue the agency’s funding. Conservative Republicans objected because they wanted Congress to rebuke President Obama over his immigration executive action, which they view as an illegal “amnesty.” Democrats protested because they wanted a “clean,” long-term spending bill that would provide certainty for the Department ...

In U.S. visit, Netanyahu warns an Iran deal could threaten Israel's existence

(Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned the United States on Monday that the nuclear deal it is negotiating with Iran could threaten Israel's survival and insisted he had a "moral obligation" to speak up about deep differences with President Barack Obama on the issue. Even as he set the stage for a Washington visit that has strained U.S.-Israeli relations, Netanyahu sought to lower the temperature ahead of his controversial address to Congress on Tuesday, saying he meant no disrespect for Obama and appreciated U.S. military and diplomatic support for Israel. Netanyahu left little doubt, however, about his objections to ongoing talks between Iran and world powers, which he said would allow Tehran to become a nuclear-armed state. "As prime minister of Israel, I have a moral obligation to speak up in the face of these dangers while there’s still time to avert them," Netanyahu told a cheering audience at the annual con...

News420

Search This Blog