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Google Sued for Allegedly Profiting From Child Porn
skinfaxi writes "Filed in New York, Jeffrey Toback claims Google has made billions by allowing child porn and 'other obscene content' providers to use sponsored links." From the article: "The suit, which claims Google acted negligently and intentionally inflicted emotional distress on the public, requests monetary damages to be determined at trial. It also accuses Google of violating federal statutes relating to child pornography and calls for the court to order that Google cease "advertising, promoting, or distributing" child pornography through its site or otherwise providing any links to such content."
From TFA: Wow...Meiselman, Denlea, Packman, Carton & Eberz managed to fit human rights in China, child pornography, and availabilty of porn to children in one sentence. A veritable trifecta of outrage.
From the above quote, you might get the idea that Meiselman, Denlea, Packman, Carton & Eberz earn a large percentage of their income from spurious lawsuits based upon righteous indignation. A quick glance at their litigation history would seem to bear out this assumption.
Again, from TFA: Now, I'm against child porn as much as the next guy (or most of them, anyway), but this is looking a lot like a fishing expedition.
Just one more quote from TFA:
Oh, that's right....it's an election year.
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
The ads typically reflect the sites that show up in your search.
Unsurprisingly this line appears in the article:
The suit, which claims Google acted negligently and intentionally inflicted emotional distress on the public, requests monetary damages to be determined at trial.
However, there is no mention of who would be getting the money. So this makes me more inclined to think that it is not "for the children" but rather "for the money".
Does anyone else find it ironic that this law firm exploits our natural instinct to protect children to try to make a money grab from Google? So who's exploiting who here? It seems like google does all it can to try to remove and filter out any type of child porn here, so how can they be liable?
"Toback, self-described as "not the most computer-literate guy," said he learned of the filter three days ago. He said he didn't know if the computers in his home have commercial filtering software that blocks pornography and other material unsuitable for children.
6 01653.story?coll=ny-top-headlines)
Toback said a lawsuit was his only alternative because Google, based in Mountain View, Calif., is beyond the legislature's control. Toback, a father of three children, ages 15, 13 and 9, filed the lawsuit as a private citizen with no county funds."
He didn't even investigate if there was a filter in google already.
He didn't investigate his own computer even *having* filtering software.
He didn't investigate using filtering software.
He didn't think that he might, i don't know, watch where his kids go on the web.
Go go gadget out sourced parenting.
(From: http://www.newsday.com/business/ny-bzgoog0505,0,2
"when life gets complicated, I like to take a nap in a tree and wait for dinner" - Hobbes.
Why don't they go after the purveyors of said pornography?
Better yet, why doesn't every country get together and decide what a child is? Or how about every U.S. state?
I wish these people would quit trying to protect everyone else's children and stick to worrying about their own.
-- Old Man Kensey
Kiddie porn?
Whatever you're looking for
you can get it on eBay.
www.eBay.com
Well, just because a country calls itself a republic doesn't mean that it is...after all, the United States calls itself a democracy...
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
As a free market promoter and anarcho-capitalist, child porn is one grey area that I don't have a good answer to. Slashdot usually has good opinions from either side of the statism coin, and this is one place that I don't doubt that both sides of the pro/anti-government debate can offer some real insight to.
I believe that our governments haven't shown any ability to fix anything they want to -- the unintended consequences of every piece of regulation seem to create preferential treatment for some elite group rather than actually solve any problems, protect those meant to be protected or reduce "crime" as they define it. Drug wars, porn wars, family value wars, oil wars, a War on Everything seems to just make Everything worse.
I think child porn is disgusting, but the victims in this case have never seemed to be helped by the law. Lawsuits by the government that are titled "The People v. Google" seem to never help The People, harm Google, and in the end the lawyers win and the government wins a case that helps it grow in power without having to be any more accountable to those paying the bills in the end.
I'm not a fan of regular porn, either, but I don't really see how anyone can stop something that has an obvious market (including child porn or the odd varieties of porn). As a believer in the Bible, I truly believe that the best way to fix society is one relationship at a time. I've helped a few friends overcome their porn issues as best as I can, by offering my time and love and helping them become accountable to someone (voluntarily). I don't think we can eradicate porn of any kind through the law, and I also believe in people's inherent right to view porn in the privacy of their homes. Is the criminal the person looking at porn, the person making it, or the person who connects the two together? I would have to say that the person who is violated would be the kid, and the perp would be the person making it. Wouldn't it be wiser to go after the real criminal?
Just because there is a black market for something doesn't mean that the person who consumes the black market product is the problem. You can't fix the drug problem by jailing non-violent drug users. You can't fix the problem by jailing non-violent drug dealers. You can only create a fair justice system by prosecuting and jailing people who committed real acts of violence regardless of the reason -- shoot someone (drug war, aggression, whatever) and you've violated someone. Run someone over with your car (drunk, aggression, whatever) and you've violated someone. The base reasoning that "it was over drugs" or "it was because of alcohol" is not a just reason -- it is the violation of the person that was the criminal act, not the base reason behind the violation.
I think the enter War on Child Porn doesn't protect the children, but it does seem to give government more and more power over our lives. If we are to criminalize an act, it should be against the perp of the act and on behalf of a real victim. "John Doe (minor) versus Crazy McCracken (perp)" is the only lawsuit I ever want to see. The People versus lawsuits should be thrown out, and we need to return tort laws to finding a real victim and a real perp.
Toback claims Google has made billions by allowing child porn and 'other obscene content' providers to use sponsored links."
Google's 2004 revenue was $3.19b
Quarterly revenue by late 2005 was up to about $1.5b
So, at a rough estimate, Google's total lifetime revenue as a company is in the ~$10b range.
To have made "billions" in child porn related sponsored links, even if we assume all of Google's revenue is from sponsored links, we'd be assuming 1/4th of all sponsored links Google has ever served were child porn? Assume 50% of their revenue is sponsored links and that jumps to a full 50% of all sponsored links Google has ever served are child porn.
Wow. The internet is a sick place. At least 25% of Google's entire business model is purely about child porn? They're evil!
Or, alternatively, the "billions" claim is completely made up by someone who saw a company with an apparently huge revenue stream and figured he could either:
a) Get rich by blowing a minor issue out of all proportion and then suing for a chunk of that revenue stream for himself.
b) Make a name for himself as the protector of all the little children, taking on the giants, and wouldn't you really like to vote for him for D.A. next year? After all, he cares about the children. WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN, PEOPLE!
Given I've not seen a single sponsored link for child porn via Google amongst the dozens of How To Make Money On EBay, How To Get Gold In WoW and various home business ads, I'm guessing a full quarter to a half of their business model is not built on child porn. So I'm going to go with self aggrandizing shyster as my guess.
I see the 'fud' tag showing up on a lot of stuff. I would like to let the intrepid tagger know that the word does not mean 'I don't like this article.' I know that's hard to understand. It's kind of the same as the fact that the 'Troll' moderation does not mean 'I don't agree.' As such, I don't expect this lesson to stick.
Please mod me down.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Hey great link! Thanks!
It's not wasting time, I'm educating myself.
Google is the gateway to porn right now, and that needs to change.
OK, I'll bite.
Why?
M-
You catch enchiladas by picking them up behind the head and holding them underwater until they don't kick anymore -VeGas
Okay, but say that you're in Michigan. The age of consent is 16 (I believe). You can go to Ontario and have sex with a 14 year old, as long as you a) are not in a position of authority over said minor, b) don't do her in the butt, and c) don't bring her into Michigan.
If a neighbouring state has a restriction of 17 or 18, you cannot bring her into Michigan for the purposes of sex, otherwise you are transporting a minor across state lines for the purpose of sex (or something like that), but if she is visiting relatives, then things are different.
To wrap it up, which is more exploitive? Having sex with someone under 18, or photographing it? I don't want to get into a big philosophical debate, but the main point that I'm trying to make, is that if you're going to sue a company that is essentially worldwide, you might want to better ensure that the rules are comparable across the board, or try to make them moreso. It's hard to prevent child pornography if it's only child pornography in one little hamlet. You can filter and control it all you want, but you'll never eliminate it.
His wife caught him "doing some research", and now he has to cover his butt by spending thousands of dollars on a frivolous lawsuit.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
http://www.nassaucountyny.gov/agencies/legis/LD/07 /index.html
I can't find it in my heart to be as level-headed as parent. From CNET:
Langdon pointed to the content policy for Google's AdWords sponsored links service, which broadly prohibits "promotion of child pornography or other non-consensual material." Langdon also noted that Google offers a filtering tool called SafeSearch that aims to block offensive content in search results.
The availability of such tools could mean that the suit may not go far. Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act protects providers and users of an "interactive computer service" from liability if it can be shown that they took good-faith measures to restrict access to obscene material. It also provides that "no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider."
The suit, which claims Google acted negligently and intentionally inflicted emotional distress on the public...
I know it's not really PC, but I hope they have a special room in hell for this guy. He knows what he's doing, and he knows that we know he knows it.
you can have my violent video games when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
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