Google's inspection of emails for targeted advertisements led to the arrest of a 41-year-old man from Houston, Texas for promoting and possession of child pornography.

Google noticed the Houston man using his email client to supposedly mail a friend several explicit photos of a young girl, according to the Los Angeles Times.

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The tech giant based in Mountain View, California allegedly notified police about the contents of the man's Gmail account. After the police obtained a search warrant, they reportedly found more child pornography in the man's tablet and phone.

The man has been identified as John Henry Skillern, a registered sex offender, and is being kept on a US$200,000 bond.

The debatable procedure of the tech giant scanning users' emails has led to cases being filed against Google for unlawfully opening and reading emails in violation of federal wiretapping statutes.

The company argued that subscribers allow them to let Google skim through messages by approving of the service's privacy policy and its terms. The tech giant said that machines, not humans, are the ones that automatically scan messages on users' account to better focus advertising on keywords that appear in emails.

Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt wrote a missive in 2013 noting numerous modifications his company had made to eliminate child pornography from search results.

Google announced last summer it was investing US$5 million to "eradicate child abuse imagery online."

"We're in the business of making information widely available, but there's certain 'information' that should never be created or found," said Google Giving Director Jacquelline Fuller in a blog on their website.

Fuller also said the company can do many things to ensure child pornography is not accessible online. She added that Google will help catch those that intend to share the illegal content and report them to authorities.

TagsGmail, cyber spying, spying, Mobile Ads, Advertisements