Family sue Google after daughter killed by ISIS gunmen in Paris terror attack
Google is being sued by a family who blame the company for a terrorist attack which saw their daughter shot dead.
The family of 23-year-old Nohemi Gonzalez has launched a lawsuit against the internet giant after the California State University Long Beach student was killed while spending a semester in Paris stuyding industrial design.
She was shot dead by Islamic State group gunmen in a series of attacks that left 130 people dead in November 2015.
The Gonzalez family alleges that Google-owned YouTube aided and abetted the Islamic State group, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, by recommending its videos to viewers most likely to be interested in them, in violation of the federal Anti-Terrorism Act.
Mum Beatriz Gonzalez and stepdad Jose Hernandez are launching the lawsuit (Scott Fain/AP/REX/Shutterstock)And now the Supreme Court is taking up its first case about a federal law that is credited with helping create the modern internet by shielding Google, Twitter, Facebook and other companies from lawsuits over content posted on their sites by others.
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The justices are hearing arguments today about whether the family of an American university student killed in a terrorist attack in Paris can sue Google for helping extremists spread their message and attract new recruits.
The case is the court's first look at Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, adopted early in the internet age, in 1996, to protect companies from being sued over information their users post online.
The US Supreme Court is taking up its first case about a federal law that is credited with helping create the modern internet by shielding Google, Twitter, Facebook (AFP/Getty Images)Lower courts have broadly interpreted the law to protect the industry, which the companies and their allies say has fueled the meteoric growth of the internet and encouraged the removal of harmful content.
But critics argue that the companies have not done nearly enough and that the law should not block lawsuits over the recommendations, generated by computer algorithms, that point viewers to more material that interests them and keeps them online longer.
It could have dramatic consequences that could affect every corner of the internet because websites use algorithms to sort and filter a mountain of data.
"Recommendation algorithms are what make it possible to find the needles in humanity's largest haystack," Google's lawyers wrote in their main Supreme Court brief.
In response, the lawyers for the victim's family questioned the possible dire consequences.
"There is, on the other hand, no denying that the materials being promoted on social media sites have in fact caused serious harm," the lawyers wrote.
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