EU Court: ‘Right To Be Forgotten’ Does Not Apply Globally ~ Digital Library

Google’s “right to be forgotten” does not apply globally, according to the top EU court.

Which means the search giant need only remove links from results in Europe—nowhere else—upon receiving a formal petition.

The case dates back to 2014, when the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that, if requested, Google must consider removing links to certain information in its search results.

But the company scrubs only those URLs that appear on its European sites: Someone querying Google.de, for instance, could switch to Google.com for uncensored results.

“Currently, there is no obligation under EU law, for a search engine operator who grants a request for de-referencing made by a data subject … to carry out such a de-referencing on all the versions of its search engine,” the Court of Justice said.

When the French Data Protection Authority (CNIL) later put pressure on Google to delist links on all sites (including Google.com), the corporation refused, challenging a €100,000 ($110,025) fine.

Now, the highest court in the land has found in Google’s favor.

“The right to the protection of personal data is not an absolute right, but must be considered in relation to its function in society and be balanced against other fundamental rights, in accordance with the principle of proportionality,” the ruling said.

“In addition,” it continued, “the balance between the right to privacy and the protection of personal data, on the one hand, and the freedom of information of internet users, on the other, is likely to vary significantly around the world.”

Origin story

The “right to erasure” was set in motion more than 20 years ago, when a large Spanish daily newspaper published an article about Mario Costeja Gonzalez’s social security debts. When the paper’s archives were later published online, the man discovered a search for his name produced the article.

Despite his attempts, both the newspaper publisher and Google refused to remove the story or the direct link, so he filed a complaint with the Spanish data protection authorities, which led to a 2010 order for Google to remove mention of his name from search results.

The Web giant appealed, and in June 2013 won a case in the EU’s Central Court of Justice, which found that search engines were not required to remove such links, provided publication of the data is legal.

That decision was overturned, however, in May 2014.

Members of the public can make a request to any organization, which then has one month to respond. There are a range of factors to consider before determining compliance.

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