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Judge in Google Case Grills Justice Department

Posted on: Tuesday, 14 March 2006, 13:40 CST

SAN JOSE, California -- A federal judge on Tuesday challenged government attorneys over whether a Justice Department subpoena for Google Inc.'s search data would be a burden on the Internet search leader.

Google's attorney said the government was overreaching, but added that the government request had been scaled back.

Shares of Google rose more than $7, or 2 percent, to about $344 after the judge spoke in the closely watched case.

The Justice Department's demand, for data the government wants Google to produce as part of a separate case over the extent to which online pornography is a threat to children, has raised concerns over how far customers can trust Google to protect the privacy of their search habits from government snooping.

Google also opposes the government request for data on the grounds it is being asked to reveal details on how its market-dominating search system operates.

"Would the study be hobbled" if Google did not concede to government demands?, U.S. District Court Judge James Ware asked government attorney Joel McElvain in one of several interruptions.

"We could perform the study. The study would be substantially improved if we had the Google data," the government attorney said in a response.

Google appeared in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Jose to answer a government subpoena for a random sample of data.

McElvain opened with arguments that the government is seeking 50,000 Web addresses and an unspecified number of search terms to test the effectiveness of filtering systems designed to protect children from sexually explicit material on the Internet.

Google is seeking to quash a subpoena for search data, which originally had included millions of user queries, in a battle over privacy issues on the Web.

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