Google has hit back at Rupert Murdoch after the media tycoon branded the search giant a "piracy leader", claiming it fought pirates and counterfeiters "every day".
The News Corporation boss recently tweeted that Google "streams movies free" and "sells [adverts] around them".
"Piracy leader is Google who streams movies free, sells advts around them," Murdoch wrote.
Murdoch remarks were in response to the US', Google's apparent opposition to some aspects of the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (Sopa), a bill that aims to tackle Internet piracy.
Google, however, reportedly told technology website Cnet that Murdoch's comments were "nonsense".
"Google respects copyright - and we've worked hard to help rights holders deal with piracy," The BBC quoted a spokesman, as saying.
"Last year we took down five million infringing web pages from our search results and invested more than 60 million dollars in the fight against bad ads," the spokesman added.
Google, an opponent of Sopa, said it believed there are better methods of protecting against copyright infringement.
The company suggested "targeted legislation that would require ad networks and payment processors - like ours - to cut off sites dedicated to piracy or counterfeiting".
{{/usCountry}}The company suggested "targeted legislation that would require ad networks and payment processors - like ours - to cut off sites dedicated to piracy or counterfeiting".
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