Attorney General Jim Hood of Mississippi on Friday agreed to call a “time out” in his fight with Google after the Internet giant filed a lawsuit accusing him of conspiring with the movie industry.  The move by Mr. Hood, who has been one Google’s most outspoken critics, came only hours after the company asserted in its lawsuit that Mr. Hood had been improperly influenced by major Hollywood studios that are trying to crack down on the distribution of pirated movies on the Internet.  The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Mississippi, had also questioned the authority of state law enforcement officials to regulate Internet service providers.  In a statement, Mr. Hood said Google was using its deep pockets in an attempt to “stop the State of Mississippi for daring to ask some questions.” Nevertheless, he said he would call the company and try to work out a deal.  “In an attempt to resolve some of the problems the states’ chief law enforcement officers have raised, I am calling a time out, so that cooler heads may prevail,” he said. Mr. Hood added that he would contact Google’s board to “negotiate a peaceful resolution to the issues affecting consumers that we attorneys general have pointed out in a series of eight letters to Google.”  Mr. Hood issued a 79-page subpoena in October, asking that the company turn over information about its search engine and sales of illegal drugs, pornography and other materials. He suggested that the company was knowingly profiting from such sales and demanded a response from Google by early January.  For several years, Google has been involved in legal wrangling with Mr. Hood and other attorneys general as the states tried to use their consumer protection authorities to push the company to crack down on such transactions. The states argued that Google benefited because of the sellers advertised on the search engine.  Emails and other records obtained by The New York Times — and which were stolen from Sony by hackers — showed how the movie industry, through a nonprofit group it funded, had hired the former attorney general from Mississippi, whom Mr. Hood used to work for, to put pressure on Mr. Hood to go after the company.  The Sony emails also showed how the major movie studios, working through the Motion Picture Association of America, had created what they called Project Goliath, a carefully orchestrated lobbying campaign to press state attorneys general not only to question Google, but to subpoena and perhaps sue the company.  The lawsuit Google filed on Friday accused Mr. Hood of violating federal law and requested that he be prevented from enforcing his subpoena.  It also accused Mr. Hood of essentially acting as a pawn for the M.P.A.A., arguing that Mr. Hood “took these actions following a sustained lobbying effort from the Motion Picture Association of America.”  An M.P.A.A. spokeswoman belittled Google’s accusations.  “Google’s effort to position itself as a defender of free speech is shameful. Freedom of speech should never be used as a shield for unlawful activities and the Internet is not a license to steal,” said Kate Bedingfield, an M.P.A.A. spokeswoman, in an emailed statement.  The lawsuit also asserted that Congress “broadly immunized computer service providers from state regulation.” Mississippi, the complaint says, did not have the legal standing to investigate the company, noting that copyright infringement, for example, is within federal, not state, jurisdiction.  A version of this article appears in print on December 20, 2014, on page B2 of the New York edition with the headline: Sued by Google, a State Attorney General Retreats. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe
The search giant accused the Mississippi official, Jim Hood, of violating federal law in his efforts to get it to remove links to some content.