Google has apologised over a racially offensive picture of MichelleObama that appeared when users searched for images of the US first lady.
The image came top of the Google Images results for “Michelle Obama”.
Google placed a notice over the picture titled “Offensive SearchResults”, saying: “Sometimes our search results can be offensive. Weagree.”
Later on Wednesday the image dropped from top image results, though the BBC understands Google did not remove it.
Instead, the image appeared to have been removed from the site thatoriginally published it, and was therefore no longer appearingprominently in Google searches.
The White House has declined to comment.
Users who click on the advertisement above the image were directedto a statement from Google, which explained that its results “caninclude disturbing content, even from innocuous queries”.
Freedom of access to the internet means much offensive materialresides there, but ordinary users are seldom exposed to it in dailyonline activity.
Occasionally, however, the world’s most popular search engine,Google, highlights such material, which is what has happened with amock-up photo of Michelle Obama.
The cause is Google’s system of algorithmic analysis, which, withouthuman intervention, ranks sites according to things like the number oflinks pointing there and the amount of activity at the site.
The shocking doctored image of Mrs Obama must have immediatelycreated a flurry of interest—mainly negative—and that sent the imageshooting up Google’s rankings.
“We apologise if you’ve had an upsetting experience using Google,” the company said.
Google says a website’s ranking in its search results relies heavilyon computer algorithms, using thousands of factors to calculate apage’s relevance to a given query.
But the search engine says it does not remove images simply because it receives complaints.
“Google views the integrity of our search results as an extremely important priority,” it said.
“Accordingly, we do not remove a page from our search results simplybecause its content is unpopular or because we receive complaintsconcerning it.”
However, the California-based web giant says it will take down certain images, if required by law to do so.
A spokesman for Google, Scott Rubin, would not give details on howthe image—which has sparked fury in the blogosphere—ended up as topresult for the wife of President Barack Obama.
‘Slippery slope’
The picture first surfaced earlier this month, when it was removedbecause the site hosting it violated Google guidelines by spreadingso-called malware—malicious software designed to infiltrate othercomputers.
But the image then reappeared on another site, apparently untaintedby malware, meaning Google was bound by its own rules not to meddlewith the search, according to technology analysts.
David Vise, a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and author of TheGoogle Story, told the BBC the search engine’s results get to the topbased on popularity, not because of any ranking system by people.
He added: “If Google got a call from the White House telling themit’s against the law to have an offensive image of this kind whichportrays the first lady in a racist manner as a monkey or an ape, thenthey would be obliged to take it down and I’m sure they would do soimmediately.”
But he said it would be a “very slippery slope” if Google were to try to police the limits of free speech.
“Once you begin to block images, who is to say. It’s like theSupreme Court of the United States once said, ‘what is pornography?’Well we can’t define it, but we know it when we see it.”