The Association of American Publishers (AAP) has filed a lawsuit against Google seeking an injunction against the Print for Libraries project, under which the search giant intends to scan and index copyrighted books held in participating libraries without explicit permission from publishers.

The suit was filed on behalf of publishers McGraw-Hill, Pearson Education, Penguin Group (USA), Simon & Schuster and John Wiley & Sons, reports the Bookseller . It seeks a declaration by the court that Google commits infringement when it scans entire books covered by copyright and a court order preventing it from doing so without permission of the copyright owner. Google has asked copyright holders to opt-out books they do not want included in the scheme.

Google responded by calling the suit a "short-sighted attempt to block Google Print [that] works counter to the interests of not just the world's readers, but also the world's authors and publishers". Referring to an opinion column written in the Wall Street Journal by Google c.e.o. Eric Schmidt, Google general counsel David Drummond said: "We believe that our product is legal, that the courts will vindicate this position, and that the industry will come to embrace Google Print's considerable benefits." Schmidt wrote: "We find it difficult to believe that authors will stop writing books because Google Print makes them easier to find, or that publishers will stop selling books because Google Print might increase their sales."

AAP president Patricia Schroeder said that the publishers viewed legal action as a last resort and had filed the suit only when Google refused to agree to making separate permissions requests for each in-copyright book it scans in the libraries of Stanford University, Harvard University and the University of Michigan. The AAP had proposed to Google that they use ISBN numbers to identify works under copyright and secure permission from publishers and authors to scan these works. The AAP said that Google had "flatly rejected this reasonable proposal".

Google is already facing a lawsuit from the US Authors Guild claiming copyright infringement ( Click here to read the full story).