Jan. 15 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. will issue a formal protest to the Chinese government over the cyber attack on Google Inc. that the company says originated from China.

“We will be issuing a formal demarche in Beijing,” likely early next week, to express U.S. concern about the incident, State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said in Washington.

In the protest, the U.S. will demand that China explain the attack that Mountain View, California-based Google says targeted its Web site and the e-mail accounts of Chinese dissidents.

Google, which owns the most popular Internet search engine, has said it plans to stop censoring results in China and may leave the Chinese market over the attack.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on the planned U.S. action.