Google has staunchly defending its compensation policy, saying that it is “blind” to gender, after the US Department of Labor accused the internet giant of not paying women the same as men.

In a blog published on the company’s website, Eileen Naughton, vice president for people and operations at Google, said that the company was “surprised” when a representative of the Department of Labor earlier this week accused Google of not compensating women fairly.

“We were taken aback by this assertion, which came without any supporting data or methodology,” she said. She added that Google’s annual analysis of pay data is “extremely scientific and robust”.

Ms Naughton said that each year, Google suggests an amount for every employee’s new compensation, which is made up of base salary, bonus and any equity, which is based on role, seniority, location and current and recent performance ratings.

She said that the suggestion is “blind” to gender meaning that the analysts who calculate proposed amounts do not have access to employees’ gender data.

“An employee’s manager has limited discretion to adjust the suggested amount, providing they cite a legitimate adjustment rationale,” she added.

When a total pay is established, Google uses a model that looks at employees in the same job categories, and analyses their compensation to confirm that the adjusted amount shows no statistically significant differences between men’s and women’s compensation, according to Ms Naughton.

Google in late 2016 performed an analysis across 52 different, major job categories within the organisation and found no gender pay gap, she said.

“Nevertheless, if individual employees are concerned, or think there are unique factors at play, or want a more individualised assessment, we dive deeper and make any appropriate corrections.”

The world’s most valuable brands Show all 10 1 /10 The world’s most valuable brands The world’s most valuable brands 1st - Google Google replaced Apple as the world’s most valuable brand, with a brand value of $109.5bn, according to Brand Finance The world’s most valuable brands 2nd - Apple Apple’s brand value declined from $145.9bn to $107.1bn in 2016 The world’s most valuable brands 3rd - Amazon Amazon's brand value rose from $69.6bn to $106.4bn in 2016 Amazon The world’s most valuable brands 4th - At&t Of the 40 telecoms brands in the ranking, AT&T in 2016 overtook Verizon as the most valuable brand rising to $87bn from $59.9bn the year before The world’s most valuable brands 5th - Microsoft Microsoft's brand value rose marginally from $67.3bn to $76.3bn in 2016 The world’s most valuable brands 6th - Samsung Amazon's brand value rose from $58.6bn to $66.2bn The world’s most valuable brands 7th - Verizon Verizon's brand value inched up from $63.1bn to $65.9bn The world’s most valuable brands 8th - Walmart Walmart's brand value rose from $53.6bn to $62.5bn The world’s most valuable brands 9th - Facebook Facebook's brand value increased sharply from $34bn to just shy of $62bn The world’s most valuable brands 10th - ICBC ICBC saw its brand value rise to $47.8bn from $36.3bn. It was the most valuabe financial brand in the world in 2016 replacing Wells Fargo

According to Google’s most recent diversity report, 31 per cent of all its employees are women but only 19 per cent of tech roles are held by females. Women hold 47 per cent of all non-tech roles and 24 per cent of all leadership positions.