They should have done it from the beginning!
It never made sense for Google (Nasdaq:GOOG) to fight the surging amount of child porn in Brazil. According to Brazilian Prosecutor Sergio Suiama, the company had refused to work with them, saying it only had to submit to U.S. law.
Orkut is the most popular social networking site in Brazil, and has been inundated with child porn, while hundreds of human rights crimes have been traced to the site. Authorities say they had 420 child pornography cases related to Orkut last year.
Brazilian prosecutors also assert that 90 percent of all illegal online activity in Brazil is connected with Orkut. Fifty percent of all 60 million Orkut users live in Brazil.
Now Google has agreed to work with Brazilian authorities in an effort to combat the horrendous practices and crimes against children.
Per the agreement, the company will filter and remove illegal content on the online community site, and will help to gather evidence that may be connected to crimes against children, when a legal order is given. Google has also agreed to keep logs saved for a 6-month period concerning those being investigated.
A lawsuit against Google was dropped when the company finally agreed to cooperate. Google on their part deny they ever resisted working with Brazilian authorities.
Google is trying to spin this now as a great action on their part, but they should have agreed to work with this from the beginning, in spite of their denials that they had. Past actions by the company make it hard to believe they were cooperating and that the Brazilian authorities were lying; which is basically what Google is saying.
I don't have any patience for a company that resists helping in crimes against children, especially when they're part of the problem.
It does make me wonder if the reason behind their resistance is the lawsuit they're fighting against Viacom (VIA-B) over YouTube content. It once again shows that Google has the ability to filter content if they choose to.
If that's the case, the emotional connection to crime against children had to override their concerns about revealing their ability to filter content.
Having said all that, at least they're doing the right thing now, even if it is belated.
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