The Google logo is seen on the top of its China headquarters building in Beijing

A US man is suing the CIA and American government after Google incorrectly auto-completed a search query he was typing in, leading to him become a victim of sustained harassment.

Jeffrey Kantor claims that Google auto-completed his search to reference bomb-making and as a result, he lost his job.

His search query was changed from ‘How do I build a radio controlled airplane’ into ‘How do I build a radio controlled bomb?’

At the time of the incident Kantor worked for a government contractor, the Appian Corporation, a software company which built Army Knowledge Online (AKO), “the world’s largest intranet” service for the US Army. It supports over 2.2 million Army, Department of Defense and other military users.

After the erroneous search query, he was visited at work by government investigators who over the course of five months, verbally abused him and subjected him to questioning.

Government officials also monitored his book purchases and home computer and secretly attached a GPS antenna to his car to track him.

But the harassment was not just at the hands of government officials. Kantor also claims that he was bullied by co workers, who would repeat back Kantor’s private information, including emails, websites he went to, books he got from the library, conversations he made in his house or in his car, phone calls and information about the contents of his house.

According to court documents, he was the victim of veiled death threats whereby coworkers would repeat stories about how there was a neighbor in their community who seemed like such a nice guy, but then went on a murder suicide.

Eventually, Kantor was fired from Appian, but allegedly received the same treatment in other firms he worked for. He is seeking $13.8 million in compensatory damages and $45 million in punitive damages for alleged civil rights violations and disclosure of private information.

He has also demanded that the government stop pursuing him.

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