The Pope was the subject of online misdirection days after the Vatican announced new rules for dealing with child abuse allegation against priests and other Church workers. The attack had Google searches for the religious leader directing people to www.pedofilo.com. According to reports, the Web site, which has a name taken from the Italian word for paedophile, is actually a religious site from Mexico.

The Vatican was the first to spot the misdirection. They promptly notified the online search Web site when they learned of the problem.

In a report from Italian news agency ANSA, a spokesman for Google Italy says that they are yet to find out what was causing the apparent misdirect.

"I cannot confirm if it is an attack because I have not had any more precise information from the US engineers to understand the nature of the problem."