Google says it has reached agreement with Viacom which means it will not have to hand over the personal data of YouTube users.

The internet giant had previously received a court order which requested viewing history data for millions of individuals who use the video-sharing site.

Viacom, which owns MTV and the Paramount film studio, wanted the data in order to "conduct a detailed examination of the viewing habits of millions of YouTube users around the world", according to the Guardian.

Google will now anonymise internet protocol addresses and other user information from its YouTube subsidiary before it hands over the data to Viacom, the newspaper adds.

The internet giant was in the news earlier in the week when its chief executive officer spoke out over Microsoft's recent pursuit of Yahoo!.

Reports said Eric Schmidt felt the company's original offer was "anti-competitive" as soon as it had been made earlier in the year.

A recent Connect survey found that the two major concerns about outsourcing services like IT support were 'loss of control' (56 per cent) and 'budget over-runs' (43 per cent)