Google Italy ruling "threat to internet freedom"

Three Google executives were convicted on Wednesday of violating privacy laws by allowing disturbing footage of a disabled Italian boy being bullied to be posted on the internet. The ruling was the first of its kind in history and was condemned by critics as "the biggest threat to internet freedom we have seen". The trial centred on footage posted on Google Videos, of a teenager suffering from Down's syndrome and who was being bullied by four other boys, at a Turin school. The footage was posted in September 2006 and became the most viewed where it remained for two months before finally being removed. Prosecutors in Milan brought the case after being contacted by the charity Viva Down and argued that the boys privacy had been violated and that Google should have removed the footage quicker than it eventually did. In the footage the boy was seen cowering as he was punched and kicked before one of the youths attacking him made a mocking call to the Viva Down charity.