Google Sues Mississippi Attorney General

Google has filed a lawsuit against Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood, accusing him of conspiring with the movie industry. According to the lawsuit, Mr. Hood had been improperly influenced by major Hollywood studios that are trying to crack down on the distribution of pirated movies on the Internet, NYT reported.

The lawsuit filed by the Internet giant also raises questions to the authority of state law enforcement officials to regulate Internet service providers.

Mr. Hood has been Google's most outspoken critics. In a statement, Mr. Hood said Google was using its deep pockets in an attempt to "stop the State of Mississippi for daring to ask some questions," according to NYT. He added that he would call the company and try to work out a deal.

"In an attempt to resolve some of the problems the states' chief law enforcement officers have raised, I am calling a time out, so that cooler heads may prevail," he said. He would contact Google's board to "negotiate a peaceful resolution to the issues affecting consumers that we attorneys general have pointed out in a series of eight letters to Google."

In October, Mr. Hood had issued a 79 -page subpoena asking Google turn over information about its search engine and sales of illegal drugs, pornography and other materials. He accused Internet giant of knowingly profiting from such sales.

Google, in the lawsuit filed, accused Mr. Hood of violating federal law and requested that he be prevented from enforcing his subpoena.