Washington, Oct 26: The global search engine Google filters out certain Internet sites in different versions of its Website to eliminate references to sites that could be "sensitive or illegal," according to a new study. The study concluded, for example, that French and German versions of Google "simply omit search results from the sites excluded from their respective versions of Google, and that this anecdotally appears to be because of pressure applied or perceived by the respective governments."

The study was released on Friday by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, which monitors issues of Internet filtering and blocking in China and elsewhere.

"Many such sites seem to offer Neo-Nazi, white supremacy, or other content objectionable or illegal in France and Germany, though other affected sites are more difficult to cleanly categorise," the report said. The sites blocked included a number of white supremacy and revisionist historical sites, but also the Chinese Legal Consultation Network, Radio Islam, and the al Jazeera TV channel. Bureau Report