Court gives landmark ruling against Google
The European Court of Justice on Tuesday gave a landmark ruling against Google that now sets a new standard in data privacy in Europe.
In its ruling the court revealed that there is a “right to be forgotten” already in EU law that Google is obliged to enforce. The precedent laid down – which applies across the EU – will now force Google and other online publishers review their management of information and links to content on the web.
The Court’s ruling was a response to a request for guidance by a Spanish court in the case of lawyer Mario Costeja Gonzalez, who wanted Google to delete links to a 1998 legal announcement in a Spanish newspaper about an auction of his property to recover social security debts. Costeja Gonzalez said the proceedings were fully resolved several years ago and reference to them was now irrelevant.
The judgment has drawn out diverse reactions from legal experts in Europe and the world over – some of whom have described the ruling as radical.
Critics of the ruling are also wondering why a data protection right which already exists (as the ECJ judges’ ruling indicate), is being asked to be explicitly be introduced into law by the European Commission.
They claim that the ruling threatens Google’s search business from the requests it may prompt from individuals seeking to remove links to nasty comments about them, unfavourable court orders or embarrassing pictures.
Richard Cumbley of Linklaters said the ruling “makes grim reading for Google”. Eduardo Ustaran, another data protection lawyer, said that the European Court of Justice’s decision was a “game-changer” for the tech world.
In practical terms, the ruling implies that Google is effectively responsible for content, even if it was simply processing it on its servers and presenting links. If it receives a legitimate request to delete information on those servers, it must do so, even if that information is still published legally on the internet.
The key part of the ruling states: “The operator of a search engine is obliged to remove from the list of results displayed following a search made on the basis of a person’s name links to web pages, published by third parties and containing information relating to that person, also in a case where that name or information is not erased beforehand or simultaneously from those web pages, and even, as the case may be, when its publication in itself on those pages is lawful.”
The deletion requests could be pictures of teenage indiscretions, insulting comments on a social media website, malicious allegations, notifications of court orders, company filings, the list goes on.
Questions have been raised as to the practicality of this latest precedent; whether it can be achieved and whether it would create an unmanageable flow of demands for deletions; what happens if a video is copied and published elsewhere and to what lengths must Google go to remove related material.
Others argue that Google and other search engines such as Yahoo or Microsoft’s Bing – will be put in a role of deciding what is in the public’s interest.
Defenders of freedom of speech are also expected to question whether the public should trust Google to refer the right cases. What happens when a budding politician with a criminal conviction or unsavory public comments that are mentioned in an online post wants it removed? Would it be right for content censorship to clear the path to them becoming a public figure?
The court however states that cases involving “public” figures, Google can challenge the deletion request and refer the case to a court or data protection authority.
Other moral concerns include requests from people out of the public eye. What happens to the fiancée of a convicted fraudster who may be deprived of the right to see information relating to their past because he/she has asked for it to be removed from Google searches or any other search platform?