By Rolfe Winkler
Google Inc. sued Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood on
Friday, seeking to prevent him from enforcing a wide-ranging
subpoena that has become entangled in a dispute between Google and
Hollywood.
Filed in U.S. District Court for Southern Mississippi, the
lawsuit claims that for 18 months, Mr. Hood has threatened to
prosecute Google if the company doesn't block certain content on
its websites. Google says that when it didn't agree to Mr. Hood's
demands, the attorney general filed "an enormously burdensome
subpoena" in late October seeking information about Internet
activity related to illegal drugs, human trafficking and
copyrighted content, among other subjects.
Google says the subpoena in unconstitutional because it seeks
information about activities protected by the First Amendment and
other federal laws.
In a statement, Mr. Hood said he and other attorneys general
want Google to restrict searches for illegal drugs and pirated
content. "Feeling emboldened with its billions of dollars, media
prowess and political power," Mr. Hood said, Google is "trying to
stop the state of Mississippi for daring to ask some
questions."
Still, Mr. Hood said he would reach out to Google's lawyers in
hopes of settling the dispute.
The lawsuit represents the latest skirmish in a longer-running
war between Hollywood and the search giant over online piracy.
That battle took a new turn this week after leaked documents
from the hacking of Sony Pictures, first published by The Verge,
suggested that movie studios were working behind the scenes with
law-enforcement officials, including Mr. Hood, to discredit Google
and revive a controversial campaign to block websites.
In a blog post published Thursday, Kent Walker, Google senior
vice president and general counsel, accused the Motion Picture
Association of America of doing "legal legwork" for Mr. Hood. The
movie industry has long tried to force Google to be more aggressive
in blocking websites that it claims are distributing its members'
copyrighted content.
A previous legislative effort backed by the movie industry, the
Stop Online Piracy Act, failed in 2012. In his Thursday blog post,
Mr. Walker said the MPAA is "trying to secretly censor the
Internet."
The MPAA responded in a statement, saying that "Google's effort
to position itself as a defender of free speech is shameful.
Freedom of speech should never be used as a shield for unlawful
activities and the Internet is not a license to steal."
The MPAA said Google is attempting to deflect attention away
from "legitimate and important ongoing investigations by state
attorneys general into the role of Google Search in enabling and
facilitating illegal conduct."
In October, Google rolled out refinements to its search
algorithm designed to make it harder to find content that allegedly
infringes copyrights.
Write to Rolfe Winkler at rolfe.winkler@wsj.com
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