Google 'Right to be Forgotten' Case

by Luke and Andres

Google 'Right to be Forgotten' Case

by Luke and Andres

In 2012, the European Commission published plans for a "Right to be Forgotten" law.  This allows people to request data about themselves to be deleted. An example of this is if a person writes something about themselves on a website or a web page and they don't want it there anymore, and they can't delete it, they can ask Google to take it down. Recently a top EU court ruled that Google must change certain search results if an individual requests it.  This is a test of the so called 'Right to Be Forgotten' law.  

The Google case was brought on by a man who objected to Google searches on his name that threw up links to a 1998 newspaper article about the repossession of his home.

EU justice commissioner Viviane Reding said, "The ruling today confirms the need to bring today's data protection rules from the digital Stone Age, into today's modern commuting world."

However, "Google said it was disappointed with the ruling, which contradicted a non-binding opinion from the ECJ's court adviser last year that said deleting sensitive information from search results would interfere with freedom of expression"

In addition, another group said,  "If search engines are forced to remove links to legitimate content that is already in the public domain but not the content itself, it could lead to online censorship"- Javier Ruiz, Policy Director at Open Rights Group (BBC: EU court backs 'right to be forgotten' in Google case)

This case opens up a lot of arguments on the right to privacy vs. the right to free speech. It will be interesting to see how Google handles this situation.