Faced with concerns by European online privacy advocates, Google promised to obscure information about people's Internet searches after only 18 months, according to media reports on Wednesday.

Google's global privacy counsel Peter Fleischer revealed late Monday that the firm's policy change in a letter to the Article 29 Data Protection Working Party in Belgium.

Fleischer's message was a response to a demand by Article 29 that Google justify why it doesn't conform to the Resolution on Privacy Protection and Search Engines adopted in London in November of 2006.

The resolution calls on search engines to erase data linking people to searches when sessions end unless they get permission to keep it.

Google said it needs to keep information about searchers and their online explorations to protect its system against attacks; expose online scams and hackers; to improve the algorithm on which searches are based and to meet requirements by law enforcement.

Google called on the Working Party to lobby European nations to make laws regarding what information has to be kept and by whom clearer and more regionally uniform for Internet firms.

The exchange between Fleischer and Working Party chairman Peter Schaar was posted on Google's website after a British human rights group concluded Google has the most abysmal privacy policies and is leading a "race to the bottom" by the world's most renowned Internet firms.

London-based Privacy International, which has monitored rights protections on the Internet since its fledgling days, ranked Google "hostile to privacy."

Google scored lower in privacy protection than rivals Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL.

Google told AFP that it is proud of its array of products and that it stands by what it claimed as a record for protecting user privacy.

"We are disappointed with Privacy International's report which is based on numerous inaccuracies and misunderstandings about our services," Google general counsel Nicole Wong said in a written statement.

"We recognize that user trust is central to our business and Google aggressively protects our users' privacy."

Google has a "vague, incomplete and possibly deceptive" privacy policy, PI concluded in the report.