Search engines in pre-natal sex ad strife

Google, Yahoo and MSN have all been named in the complaint put forward to India’s Supreme Court.

Pre-natal sex selection is believed to result in the abortion of 900,000 female fetuses annually in India and advertising of services and products to support the practice is illegal in the country. “The regulations that prevent these advertisements are well established in traditional media, but online has been less regulated,” said a source.

Sabu George, the activist heading the campaign, has been quoted saying that the search engines allow for highly targeted advertising of products that claim to aid in sex selection.

A Google spokesman said: “The Google advertising programme is managed by a set of policies which we develop based on several factors, including legal requirements and user experience. In India, we do not allow ads for the promotion of pre-natal gender determination or pre-conception sex selection. We take local laws seriously and will review the petition carefully.”

In terms of revenue, sources suggest that there may be a temporary setback. “But the future of these search engines in India is hardly in trouble - the government simply can’t ban everything,” said a source.

Seperately, Google may be forced to disclose the identity of a blogger named in a defamation lawsuit.