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BRITAIN: Google, the world's biggest search engine, is being sued by a lone London businessman in a landmark legal action that could hold the American-based company liable for the publication of inaccurate, malicious or damaging material on the internet.
The case, the first of its kind in this country to attempt to make search engines responsible for the content of the internet, could trigger severe restrictions to the free flow of information on the world wide web.
Last night internet experts warned that if the action was successful it would mean Google could be held liable for the content of 11.5 billion webpages.
The case is being brought by a 48-year-old man from Wembley who instructed a City law firm to begin defamation proceedings after the search engine directed users to web pages that the businessman claims contained "deeply offensive and commercially damaging" material about his enterprises.
In one anonymous posting on an internet discussion forum, Brian Retkin, managing director of internet company Dotworlds, is wrongly accused of cashing in on the September 11 attacks on America, by offering the free registration of domain names to the US in a way that took advantage of the fervent patriotism at the time.
In other anonymous postings he is wrongly and groundlessly accused of conducting fraudulent business. The allegations are believed to have originated in America, where it is much more difficult to succeed in a libel claim.
US judges have ruled that search engines and other third party internet service and product providers are immune from defamation lawsuits.
But in Britain similar legal protection is conditional on the company not having notice of the complaint. And in Britain this area of the law is yet to be fully tested.
Mr Retkin, whose internet company is a domain name registrar (a company which allows customers to register domain names on the internet), says he has spent three years trying to persuade Google to permanently remove the libellous allegations from its search results.
In a letter sent to Google, Franklin Price, a litigation partner at law firm Jeffery Green Russell, has given formal written notice of the defamation action under the court's pro-action protocol.
"There comes a point," said Mr Retkin, "when someone must take responsibility for this material. These allegations were posted anonymously so there is no way of suing the author. Where it has appeared on internet discussion forums we have asked them to remove but it keeps popping up again at other internet addresses. The only solution is for Google to remove it and give an undertaking they will remove it permanently."
In legal correspondence between Mr Retkin and Google, a California-based company with sales and marketing offices in London, claims that it has "blacklisted" the offending links and removed the material complained of by Mr Retkin.
It also rejects the idea that it should be responsible for the contents of links produced in an internet search.
In an email written by Google's legal counsel Harjinder Obhi, the company argues: "Google is not responsible for the content of any result of a query which maybe presented to a user of Google's web search service.
Google has absolutely no connection, control or ability to direct or influence the content of web pages which maybe shown as links within any given set of search results.
The infinitely variable terms in which searches can be made (any query which a human being can conceive of) are obviously not within Google's control, nor should they be."
Mr Obhi adds: "Google's search engine is not sentient. It does not understand the context or intention of a search query at the point in time at which the query is submitted."
Google maintains that even if it were possible to filter searches for defamatory content that blocking "combinations of words" would also block lawful websites and therefore have a "significant detrimental impact" on searches of the internet.
But Mr Retkin, who employs eight staff in China, Brazil and London and has recently received a grant from the London Development Agency, says that this means he has no effective means of redress.
In a case last year supported by Google, the California Supreme Court held that bloggers and US internet service or product providers cannot be liable for the posting of defamatory comments written by third parties.
Mr Retkin said yesterday: "At the moment Google and other search engines are protected by the law but the victim of the defamation is forgotten. Neither does the law take account of innocent third-parties who in good faith rely on material found in an internet search and then can end up getting sued for defamation."
Jeffery Green Russell has written to Google asking for an immediate undertaking that the specific internet links will be removed or the case will continue to the High Court. In a separate case, a filmmaker has also contacted Google in an attempt to get the company to remove "embarrassing" comments he made on a discussion forum which he says keep appearing when Google searches are done using his name.
The man, who lives in north London but wishes to remain anonymous, says that the references to "adolescent comments" he made 15 years ago have prevented him finding work and girlfriends.
He told the Independent: "I succeeded in having Google remove the original posts, but they refuse to touch messages by other 'Usenet' contributors quoting my messages, so my name and other quoted paragraphs are still available within other people's postings."
He explained: "There is nothing compromising in what I wrote there, but it is idle chat, written by the person I was 15 years ago, and as such discourage potential employers and new relationships to engage with myself because it is silly and immature."
A Google spokesman said: "We don't comment on the detail of individual cases. Like every other search engine we are not responsible for the content of the internet.
"We enable people to search the web. If someone believes they have been defamed on a website then the first thing they should do is complain to the publisher of that website.
"If a court decides that material is indeed defamatory, because we comply with all local laws then we would remove links in our search result to that content."
- THE INDEPENDENT
