Google Not Winning On Removing Information
July 31, 2014
Google has faced numerous lawsuits about having content removed from search results. International Business Times explains about a current battle in the UK: “Google’s Right To Be Forgotten: 70,000 Politicians, Criminals, And Individuals Want Offending Content Erased.” The European Union Court of Justice ruled in May that European citizens have the “right to be forgotten” and thusly their information removed from search results. Google’s received over 70,000 takedown requests. Google argues that it helps people keep their reputations intact and able to recover from past mistakes.
Google has removed many links related to UK media organizations. As one can imagine, users are not too happy about this, because the common belief is that once it is on the Internet it should be free to all.
Google says the opposite.
“ ‘The issues at stake here are important and difficult, but we’re committed to complying with the court’s decision,’ writes [David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer]. ‘Indeed, it’s hard not to empathise with some of the requests that we’ve seen – from the man who asked that we do not show a news article saying that he had been questioned in connection with a crime (he’s able to demonstrate that he was never charged) to the mother who requested that we remove news articles for her daughter’s name as she had been the victim of abuse.’ “
Google’s created an advisory council to handle all request. They even post the question “How should one person’s right to be forgotten be balanced with the public’s right to know?” on the page. It is a philosophical question, but it appears to be taken on a case by case basis. How long will Google be willing to do that?
Whitney Grace, July 31, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
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