Briefs

March 19, 2006, CNET

A federal judge's ruling Friday afternoon that Google has to give the U.S. government a limited amount of information it's seeking--but not search queries--was immediately heralded by many bloggers as a victory not just for the search giant, but for overall privacy rights.

The Justice Department requested the data to help it back its case in a pending trial over an antipornography law. But unlike some of its competitors, Google resisted the subpoena for search data, saying that the data would not be relevant and that the request would put consumers' privacy at risk.

Judge James Ware ruled that Google will have to hand over 50,000 Web addresses from its search index, but it won't have to reveal terms its users had been searching for.

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