Video: Is Google protecting Islam?
posted at 9:30 am on January 12, 2010 by Ed Morrissey
I’ve seen this in e-mail threads for at least a week now, but when Fox & Friends, Mediaite, and the London Telegraph cover it, the question has gone mainstream. Google appears to be blocking search suggestions (but not searches) on the phrase “Islam is,” while allowing for all sorts of suggestions for all other religions:
Google’s search Suggest function treats Islam a bit differently from the other major religions of the world. It’s willing to suggest “Christianity is bullshit” or “Judaism is false,” but if you begin to ask what Islam is, it won’t suggest a thing.
Google says that this search oddity is a bug – and that its search gurus are working to fix it. But several days have passed since it was publicly uncovered.
As originally noticed by The Next Web blog, Suggest isn’t shy about suggesting search queries that put several major religions in a less-the-favorable light. If you type, “Christianity is” into Google’s search box, for instance, the web giant suggests queries such as “Christianity is bullshit,” “Christianity is not a religion,” “Christianity is a lie,” and “Christianity is fake” …
Google already has a bad reputation in the on-line world for playing footsie with the Chinese government in helping enforce their censorship, and lesser offenses such as not recognizing some holidays with special graphics while celebrating others. Google claims that this is a bug in their system and that they’re working to fix it. That explanation seems odd at first glance, though, since the problem only appears to afflict Islam, and not Taoism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, and so on.
On the other hand, the actual searches work fine. Since that’s the main function of Google, and since the suggestion strings don’t interfere with the searches themselves, the bug explanation may make some sense. A search on “Islam is false” (a common suggestion for other religions) returns 13,600,000 links. If Google intended to “protect” Islam or enforce a standard of political correctness, restricting search suggestions seems the least effective way of doing so. This looks like a non-issue.
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Who cares? I don’t use Google because of crap like this. Bing works as well and they honor American exceptionalism.
csdeven on January 12, 2010 at 9:34 AM
For this and other reasons, I have not used Google since 2008. I also do not use search engines which also search in Google. Ixquick is what I use these days.
Kermit on January 12, 2010 at 9:34 AM
Fine. If it is a bug, fix it. If it is a corporate decision, it won’t be fixed and that speaks volumes.
kingsjester on January 12, 2010 at 9:34 AM
Well, it is. Islam is the only radical political ideology with a religion attached to it.
highhopes on January 12, 2010 at 9:35 AM
A bug?
Explain how that happens and I’ll buy it.
bridgetown on January 12, 2010 at 9:35 AM
I haven’t used google since Bing came out. What’s that been, six months?
jaime on January 12, 2010 at 9:36 AM
I got on google and searched “islam is” and got this on the first page.
Amazon.com: While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying …Amazon.com: While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within (9780385514729): Bruce Bawer: Books.
http://www.amazon.com › … › Islamic Government – 4 hours ago – Cached – Similar
Video results for islam is
boomer on January 12, 2010 at 9:36 AM
Try “mohammad is”
apostic on January 12, 2010 at 9:36 AM
What I got was “Islamabad is the capital of what country?” as a suggestion.
mankai on January 12, 2010 at 9:36 AM
It’s the PC bug. It’s a national epidemic.
Fletch54 on January 12, 2010 at 9:37 AM
When I typed in “Google is—” I get:
Google is skynet
Google israel
Google is watching you
Google is your friend
Google is making us stupid
Heh.
Weight of Glory on January 12, 2010 at 9:38 AM
There is a big difference between hosting content, and suggesting it.
Something is not right, here.
OldEnglish on January 12, 2010 at 9:38 AM
Islam is on bing.com
You’ll have to play around a bit…
Canadian Infidel on January 12, 2010 at 9:39 AM
The top suggestion for “Barack Obama is”
And shouldn’t we first determine what the meaning of the word “is” is?
mankai on January 12, 2010 at 9:39 AM
There have been many google incidents of this sort — Bing works nicely and I refuse to give google the traffic.
GnuBreed on January 12, 2010 at 9:40 AM
I discovered that Google is God.
highhopes on January 12, 2010 at 9:40 AM
I’m increasingly leery of using Google as a search engine. try “Reagan and job creation” and see your top returns—awfully biased, awfully slanted. The ill-understood mechanisms and algorithms by which this engine searches, categorizes and returns information is concerning. There has to be alternatives.
Like Bing.
ted c on January 12, 2010 at 9:41 AM
I use Bing, too. It just works better.
Ed Morrissey on January 12, 2010 at 9:42 AM
There is also a ZDnet report on Google’s connection to spyware:
“A prominent anti-spyware researcher is calling on Google to sever its ties with an advertising partner that covers popular sites with pop-up PPC advertisements promoting those same sites.
According to Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at the Harvard Business School and a staunch anti-spyware advocate, Google is charging advertisers for what he described as “conversion-inflation” traffic from the WhenU spyware program.”
I don’t think Google is so much trying to protect Islam as it is trying to protect the lives of its employees. Some Muslims seem to get a tad bit homicidal if you say anything negative about Islam.
rbj on January 12, 2010 at 9:42 AM
Google is dead to me. This is nothing compared to their handling of things like Memorial Day, etc.
Spirit of 1776 on January 12, 2010 at 9:43 AM
Bing! Baby. Bing! I would sell my Google stock, if I had any. I don’t think they have anywhere to go in the long term than down.
Leopold Stotch on January 12, 2010 at 9:43 AM
You can search any number of terrible things about Islam on Google. I just did. This is, indeed, a non-issue.
Bleeds Blue on January 12, 2010 at 9:43 AM
google is evil and scares the crap out of me
Monica on January 12, 2010 at 9:44 AM
I’m not buying the bug explanation. The auto-suggest script works by reading the words typed in the search box then suggesting the most popular search strings that match.
You can’t have a “bug” like this unless you’re parsing the type characters and filtering.
flipflop on January 12, 2010 at 9:44 AM
That website is hilarious.
I tried Bing. It doe not match google in speed or accuracy. If someone can recommend a better search engine, I’m all ears.
nyx on January 12, 2010 at 9:45 AM
I disagree that it’s not a big deal. Any political or religious discrimination committed by Google is ALWAYS a bug or an oversight or a coincidence.
I don’t really give a crap because I haven’t used Google on a regular basis for at least 3 years now, however it is a big deal nonetheless.
MobileVideoEngineer on January 12, 2010 at 9:45 AM
I stopped using google after the global warming summit.
However, they’re everywhere now with phones, youtube, etc.
And people were worried about Microsoft.
rollthedice on January 12, 2010 at 9:45 AM
No way in hell this is a bug. That is laughable on it’s face.
I use Bing.
Google is evil.
Joe Caps on January 12, 2010 at 9:45 AM
I tried not using google. But bing just isn’t as good. Period. Wish they were but until then, I’ll keep with these America hating pricks.
angryed on January 12, 2010 at 9:46 AM
I recommend this one instead:
Barack Obama stole your new bicycle
SnowSun on January 12, 2010 at 9:50 AM
try: is islam
There are similar results their as to Christianity is
Unfortunetly in my job I can’t live without Google, as I buy ads on it all day long. But yeah, I think it is a bug. A strange bug, but still likely a bug.
profgubler on January 12, 2010 at 9:51 AM
Starve the beast! DO NOT USE GOOGLE.
Google=commies. Google=Pro Islam.
Use scroogle. No data mining. They HATE Google.
.org. repeat. DOT ORG… If you go .com you’ll get a porno site… Google made sure of that!
http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/scraper.htm
katy on January 12, 2010 at 9:51 AM
My “Islam is” search shows 98 million links. Looks like the “Bug” is fixed.
Oh, and for you Bing users, I recall seeing several search issues that could be called politically motivated.
BierManVA on January 12, 2010 at 9:51 AM
I still use Yahoo!, so there.
SouthernGent on January 12, 2010 at 9:52 AM
Type in “Islam bull”.
See what drops down.
If Google is doing this, they’re doing it sloppily.
MadisonConservative on January 12, 2010 at 9:52 AM
Exactly. The scripts work on their own. It’s not like they should be coded different for every possible combination. It’s not like should be seperate “Buddhism is” and “Islam s” code, where there could be a bug in the code for the “Islam is.” Unless they added the code…
Joe Caps on January 12, 2010 at 9:53 AM
You miss the point.
It’s not an issue of whether you can do the search, the issue is if whether ‘do no evil’ is treating them differently. It’s an issue of principle.
Like Ed an other enlightened men, I like Bing.
Spirit of 1776 on January 12, 2010 at 9:55 AM
My personal experience is that Yahoo is just as good when it comes to relevancy. You may not get the volume that you get from Google, but the site that I made for my parents is number 1 on Yahoo if you search their company name and it’s like number 5 on Google because the twitter site I created for them comes up before their actual website.
Volume means nothing if the volume is a bunch of crap.
MobileVideoEngineer on January 12, 2010 at 9:55 AM
The specifics are ill-understood, but as a general rule, results rank by the number of relevant links they get from other sites. Since the net is full of lefties, I wouldn’t be surprised if good results for liberals and bad results for conservatives popped up.
Darth Executor on January 12, 2010 at 9:55 AM
Some choice ones from http://barackobamastoleyournewbicycle.com/
BARACK OBAMA PEES IN YOUR GAS TANK
BARACK OBAMA WILL NOT FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT TO PARTY
BARACK OBAMA WETS THE BED AND BLAMES IT ON YOU
…actually, he blames it on George Bush, or Bo, or his mother-in-law, but whatever.
SnowSun on January 12, 2010 at 9:56 AM
Seems to me that they’re interest is more in protecting themselves from the Jihadists.
If they put up suggestions like those you list for Christianity and other religions, there would be a fatwa on their heads faster than you can say Mohammed was a pervert.
MarkTheGreat on January 12, 2010 at 9:57 AM
I’ve changed my home page to bing.com instead of google.
Thanks for the Tip!!!
bridgetown on January 12, 2010 at 9:58 AM
“Barack Obama is an idiot” returns 72,900,000 hits.
heh.
cntrlfrk on January 12, 2010 at 9:58 AM
Bing is another commie. Bing and Soros=best friends.
Choose your poison…
katy on January 12, 2010 at 10:00 AM
try searching
muhammad is an ugly duckling
blatantblue on January 12, 2010 at 10:00 AM
Google is evil.
Bing’s serach suggestions include Islam is of the devil, evil, a lie, etc. So yay for Bing.
Akzed on January 12, 2010 at 10:01 AM
Even Worse…. type in “christianity is”
WTF!!
Indian Outlaw on January 12, 2010 at 10:01 AM
Apostic, you’re right. I like the suggestion ‘muhammed is a pig’. Mmmm, bacon.
hogfat on January 12, 2010 at 10:02 AM
This isn’t a “non-issue”. Google is willing to return search results…those results are the responsibility of other websites, not Google…but Google isn’t about to recommend anything!
stonemeister on January 12, 2010 at 10:02 AM
shouldn’t we first determine what the meaning of the word “is” is?
mankai on January 12, 2010 at 9:39 AM
Wild Bill has given U.S. the definition of is under oath, so that is all there is to know what is is. Re-framing the question to; “How is it done, or is it done?” would be an appropriate follow-up to his definition
Perhaps the most pressing questions involving the term ‘is’ Is this all Dem have to offer U.S.?
MSGTAS on January 12, 2010 at 10:03 AM
It’s simple, they don’t want to get bombed or have their employees kidnapped and beheaded.
You won’t find any heroes at Google.
FireBlogger on January 12, 2010 at 10:05 AM
Captain,
I like the optimism radiating from the phrase:
No, really?
TomB on January 12, 2010 at 10:05 AM
You seem to be going out of your way to give the benefit of the doubt on this. Monkeys might fly out of my a**, too, but the two issues are about as likely, IMHO.
mwdiver on January 12, 2010 at 10:07 AM
Tested that also…I have switch my default to Bing…and thus the E V I L Microsoft.
WashJeff on January 12, 2010 at 10:07 AM
Try googling “Muslim is “… you’ll find bullshit, a cult, wrong, etc.
Just sayin’
Terp Mole on January 12, 2010 at 10:08 AM
Google out…Bing in….thank you very much.
SHARPTOOTH on January 12, 2010 at 10:11 AM
This phenomenon may simply be a function of the fact that islam begins with the letters “is” and google search doesn’t process the redundancy.
Terp Mole on January 12, 2010 at 10:12 AM
Time to make Bing my sole search engine.
indy8 on January 12, 2010 at 10:12 AM
Way off topic, but how pathetic are liberals currently that the #80 most influential liberal in America is…
Hahahahaha.
Be proud, libs, be proud.
Abby Adams on January 12, 2010 at 10:12 AM
For more fun with google/bing differences.
Google “Climategate”, note the number of results; now use bing for the same search.
I got 1.9 Million results from google and 51.3 Million on bing. I can see a few percentage points variance, but that large of one?
Nathan_OH on January 12, 2010 at 10:13 AM
Search for google is on Google. You get Google is watching you, making us stupid, the devil etc.
Akzed on January 12, 2010 at 10:13 AM
The reason of course is that “Islam is…DANGEROUS”.
SILENCE!!
I KEEEL YOU!
Sefton on January 12, 2010 at 10:14 AM
No one has said you don’t get search results. But when you type “Islam is” in the Google window it does not suggest anything. The “bug” is not fixed.
BoSox_or_Bust on January 12, 2010 at 10:15 AM
This is stupid. Its a glitch. It works now. It was not some conspiracy. Cannot find cartoons about Mohammad, why?
Ed Laskie on January 12, 2010 at 10:15 AM
Have been long time Google user. Still use it as main search engine but have Bing/Google combo in navigation bar.
If you are looking to get a politically incorrect search tool, you’re going to be “searching” a long time, and if you find one, it will be an inferior search engine to boot.
donh525 on January 12, 2010 at 10:17 AM
Snopes internet hoax message board offers this plausible explanation;
Sounds reasonable.
Terp Mole on January 12, 2010 at 10:19 AM
Want to get really mad?
Type in “nail”.
You’ll get three auto completes for “nailin Palin”.
Who are they trying to kid?
Rebar on January 12, 2010 at 10:22 AM
Doesn’t work here. Did you type in “Islam is” ??? Probably not. You probably typed in ‘islam’, like some here who just don’t ‘get it’.
bridgetown on January 12, 2010 at 10:22 AM
Why didn’t you rotters tell me that Bing was Microsoft!?
I’ll have to buy my Mac some chocolates, now! :)
OldEnglish on January 12, 2010 at 10:24 AM
Sorry. Here’s the Snopes internet hoax discussion thread link “Is Google censoring Islam suggestions? (cited above).
Terp Mole on January 12, 2010 at 10:24 AM
Bing — Yes.
tarpon on January 12, 2010 at 10:24 AM
Funny how all of Google’s bugs seem to work in the same direction. You’d think at least one bug would work in the opposite way once in a while, e.g., celebrating Veteran’s Day and then forgetting Thanksgiving.
Aitch748 on January 12, 2010 at 10:25 AM
Google is anti-American, anti-firearm and it SUCKS!
NRA Lifer on January 12, 2010 at 10:26 AM
Just go to the google search page and type “google is” and it should suggest “a bunch of liars”.
Perhaps they should refer to it as an undocumented feature. I’m sure it came about because the caving cowards tried to create some special programming for the religion of peace.
Let’s face it though, when a religious sect will kill you for disagreeing with them, you do need to treat them a little differently. Modifying google wasn’t exactly what I was thinking though.
Support google’s religious tolerance by using Bing!
ClanDerson on January 12, 2010 at 10:27 AM
Including Spoof sites under news…
Always bumping Huffington Post to the top…
Reading email for ads from senders who don’t sign up…
Bumping anti-Right sites and burying anti-Left sites…
…Google is a joke.
Ejasz on January 12, 2010 at 10:28 AM
When I read this I changed to Bing which I never knew existed before this story.
royzer on January 12, 2010 at 10:32 AM
Come on folks, I enjoy a good conspiracy as much as the next guy but there isn’t any grassy knoll here and any fake moon wind waving the Apollo lander flag.
When you type “Islam is” the google algorithm simply interprets this sequence as searching for the same word twice and doesn’t process the redundancy.
Get a grip.
Terp Mole on January 12, 2010 at 10:36 AM
Just in: this cute little fill in the blank stuff isn’t limited to Christianity, also works with “Judaism is” and “Buddhism is” for what it’s worth. Also check out scroogle.org for ad-free pirated google algorithms that can display up to 100 search results. Fire w/ Fire baby!!!
abobo on January 12, 2010 at 10:43 AM
Their “bug” also applied to Mohammed….type in Mohammed is and nada. But type in Jesus is and…well you know what you will get.
angryed on January 12, 2010 at 10:47 AM
Try searching Google for “allah the moon god”.
Of course, I believe islam to be a cult manufactured by an evil murdering tyrant (mohammed) and is no more a real religion than the delusion invented by L. Ron Hubbard.
wildcat84 on January 12, 2010 at 10:48 AM
Oh ya? Well, well, google’s picasa software has facial recognition built in and you can use it to identify people in your family reunion pictures so when someone asks you ‘who is that next to Aunt Bee’, you can find out. Especially if you’ve shared your family images on web albums.
It works really well when you show up on security camera frames too.
Skandia Recluse on January 12, 2010 at 10:50 AM
That’d be true if it weren’t for the fact that “Israel is“, “Isabelle is” and “Istanbul is” still all return something.
Not Islam. Nada.
somewhatconcerned on January 12, 2010 at 10:50 AM
I haven’t tried bing yet, but from all the testimonials I’ve read, I think it’s worth a try.
I won’t use google, after a friend told me they log, and keep everything. I also know they are huge Obama supporters. Couple this Islam issue with…I will stand with my muslim brothers, and that’s enough to keep me away from google for a lifetime.
capejasmine on January 12, 2010 at 10:50 AM
on Google news enter just Obama.
The top things returned are HuffPo and an AJC op-ed favoring an increase on taxes for banks. I’m wondering if that’s part of the same “bug”.
angryed on January 12, 2010 at 10:51 AM
Strictly speaking, this probably is technically a “bug.” It is unlikely they programmed their engine to specifically edit responses to “Islam is.”
But it’s also completely implausible that an advanced search engine randomly decides to treat one noun differently than all the others.
If all they’d done was edit this one intransitive segment pattern, they could have changed it back in no time at all. If they can’t, that means the censorship programming goes way, way deeper than this.
logis on January 12, 2010 at 10:52 AM
This is NO software glitch. Google, like most westerners is afraid of these rag head scum, and their false religion! Grow some balls Google!
Confederate on January 12, 2010 at 10:58 AM
This is NOT a non-issue.
Each of these:
“buddhism is ”
“Judaism is ”
“Christianity is ”
provide suggestions that pain the particular religion in a negative light, which Christianity being the most insulting:
Christianity is bullshit
Christianity is Not a religion
Christianity is a lie
Christianity is false
Christianity is a cult
Christianity is wrong
Christianity is fake
Christianity is dying
Christianity is jewish
Christianity is not a religion t-shirt
However “Islam is” completely closes the suggestion window.
This is not a bug.
Text/search/index code doesn’t work that way.
The suggestion engine not displaying results for “Islam” was specifically coded IN to the suggestion application.
It’s just another example of dumping on chrisianity, while restricting speech for Islam.
I am sure google coded in the Islam exception to keep them off the Islamic furor radar.
Thune on January 12, 2010 at 10:58 AM
Any thoughts on ask.com? That has been my preference as a search engine.
onlineanalyst on January 12, 2010 at 11:00 AM
Right. And when you type “is is” there’s nothing about Bill Clinton either.
Terp Mole on January 12, 2010 at 11:00 AM
I won’t use Google, I’ve been with Yahoo since the beginning. A search for Islam is brings up things like:
Islam is the way of life
Islam is peace
Islam is the light
But also:
Islam is false
Islam is wrong
However, when you substitute Christianity is, all of the first items are negative.
All that proves is that more people are doing negative searches on Christianity than on Islam.
Common Sense on January 12, 2010 at 11:02 AM
I am a software engineer and I have worked on web software and database back-ends. If it is a bug, then it is a trivial one. With Google’s engineers this would take less then a day to fix, if that. Assuming they make it a priority to fix it. If it is not a bug and a statistics based (hit rate) anomaly, then they should be able to produce a DB query showing as much in about the same amount of time.
So yes, I think it is intentional. And although I am an Catholic I regard it as a nit-pick.
drocity on January 12, 2010 at 11:05 AM
Also, “Christianity ch” returns suggestions, so does “buddhism bu”, so does “hinduism hi”
Terp Mole…your “explanation” was extremely easy to test out and prove wrong, but you chose to parrot what you read somewhere as fact and ridicule those who don’t “get it” like you do. Maybe you shouldn’t be so hostile when you can’t back up what you know to be “true.” You, my friend, are the one who needs to “get a grip.”
Joe Caps on January 12, 2010 at 11:05 AM
Google is teh evil.
But even so, it will dominate.
I’ve got a friend [and a brother] involved in IT work; they wouldn’t consider using any search engine to hunt down problems. Period.
I’m just content to by-pass them whenever possible.
One example: an alternative to the Chrome browser.
All of the speed [and tricks] with none of spy [tracking] bits. It’s not as nifty as Firefox, but it does a have a very small ‘foot-print’.
It’s my preferred secondary browser, and you can exclude google as a search engine as a setting.
CPT. Charles on January 12, 2010 at 11:06 AM
Disagree.
I think this is an issue of political correctness rather than protecting the religion. If google wanted to not offend Muslims at first glance this is the way to do it. Non-islam religions are much shorter on those who are quickly offended. Muslims are less likely to be offended if they don’t see “islam is false”.
PC.
shick on January 12, 2010 at 11:07 AM
Is Google protecting islam? NO.
Is Google covering it’s rather large tuckus? HELL yeah.
Could Google be engaging in leftist BS about world history in regards to the West and islam? Probably, but most likely they are just covering their rather large tuckus. Self-preservation can be much stronger than principle. After all, despite the BS propogated by the left, when was the last time a little old lady from St. Patrick’s in NYC set off a suicide bomb, tried to kill a cartoonist, or killed a director?
TQM38a on January 12, 2010 at 11:10 AM
Scroogle w/an SSL encrypted connection. Don’t be a chump.
mojo on January 12, 2010 at 11:18 AM
Google has long since stopped being independent. They cooperated with the ChiComs, and they are lobbying for net neutrality here…except for stuff that makes them money.
Government + industry = fascism.
PattyJ on January 12, 2010 at 11:28 AM
The proof that it isn’t a “glitch”: Predict what “muslims are” would bring up. Yep, it closes. It closes for any search that starts with a religion followed by the word “are”, except for “satanists”. Go check out what it recommends for “satanists are”
Buddahpundit on January 12, 2010 at 11:32 AM
Type in “Jihad is” (with a space after “is”)
Only five positives
nottakingsides on January 12, 2010 at 11:36 AM
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