Feds to Google: "Hand over the milk money!"

..."Or prepare to suffer a severe wedgie!"

Have you guys read this? Basically, some government folks need some research data in order to push a new law through, and they want to get it from Google. Their way? Order the company to turn over their entire search database for their perusal. Naturally, Google has refused, claiming that compliance with such a request would reveal sensitive personal information about their users (and violate users' trust), not to mention company trade secrets. So, an official subpoena has been issued.

I'm... well, I'm shocked! I can't believe that the government can just walk into someone's (in this case, a corporation's) living room and say, "We want your stuff for our research. Hand it over. Cause we're the government." Google has nothing to do with their case -- the government just thinks it would be convenient to use their data, so issues this heavy-handed order to procure it.

Fed 1: "Hey, where can we get a lot of info for our research?"
Fed 2: "Whenever I need info, I use Google!"
Fed 1: "Good idea. Order them to give us their stuff, or else."
Fed 2: "MUAHAHAHAHAHA...!"

(Okay, maybe I'm getting a little carried away with that last part...)

What further chaps my ass about this is the government's justification for their request: they claim they are attempting to push through an important child-protection law, and that the importance of such a matter trumps Google's privacy concerns. They even claim their law has something to do with child porn. If this were the case, it would be grave indeed, and I would have a hard time "choosing" sides. But here's the thing: it's nothing to do with child porn! It has to do with restricting websites that minors can access, including porn sites. This sounds significantly less dire than "child porn" -- and besides, isn't which websites a minor visits the parents' responsibility? It's like passing a law in order to restrict what kind of tv shows or channels a child watches.

This is all about restricting information flow under the guise of protecting children. And it doesn't even have the cloak of "national security", for pete's sake... Sigh! The whole thing smells fishy. I'll be interested to see how Google responds when the pressure increases, and what public opinion is. Not to mention how this matter may hurt Google stock.