Studios say Google benefits from piracy

Mon Feb 12, 2007 8:03 AM

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A group of major media companies has accused Google Inc. of benefiting from the sale of pirated movies and providing business support to two Web sites suspected of offering access to illegal film downloads, the Wall Street Journal said on Monday.

The media companies, which the paper said include News Corp., Viacom Inc., Sony Corp., General Electric Co.'s NBC Universal, Time Warner Inc. and Walt Disney Co., allege that Google deliberately directed traffic to Web sites that were engaged in fostering piracy, the paper said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Google told the studios on Friday it would implement new procedures to prevent recurrences, the Journal said.
No one at Google could be immediately reached to comment on the report.
The paper said the claims against Google were based on sworn statements made late last year as part of a civil lawsuit brought by Hollywood studios against two men accused of operating Web sites that allegedly helped users illegally access copyrighted material.

These statements indicated that Google representatives sold advertisements to these two sites knowing they were doing this, and had a close relationship with the two defendants, the paper said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Meanwhile, talks among several of the media companies about creating a service to rival Google's YouTube have heated up again, the newspaper said, citing company executives involved in the discussions.