On Wednesday, three Google executives were imprisoned on the charge of violating Italian privacy laws.

Prosecutors said that Google handled user data and used content to generate advertising revenue, and therefore broke Italian privacy law.

The law prohibits the use of someone’s personal data with the intent of harming him or making a profit.

Google is already facing troubles in business since past few days. While in Europe it was charged with antitrust complaints, Google threatened to withdraw from China after the hackers attack on the search giant.

In Italy, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi owns most private media and indirectly controls public media.

“It’s a deliberate effort to control the means of communication”, said Juan Carlos de Martin, the Founder of the Nexa Center at Turin’s Polytechnic University, which studies Internet use in Italy.

Prosecutors also said Google was not quick enough to remove a widely viewed video from the site posted in 2006 showing a group of teenage boys pestering an autistic boy.

But Google said that it had removed the video within two hours of receiving a formal complaint from the Italian police, two months after the video was first posted.

Bill Echikson, a spokesman for Google, called the ruling “astonishing” and said the company would appeal.