EU, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo Meet on 'Right to be Forgotten'
- By Matt Holden
- Jul 25, 2014
European data protection authorities met with Google, Microsoft and Yahoo about the implementation of a recent ruling that gave European citizens the right to be forgotten.
The May ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) gave people the right to compel search engines to remove search results in Europe for queries that include a person’s name, if the results shown are “inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant, or excessive.”
The implementation of this ruling has been harder to execute than originally expected, and Google has already described the guidelines for the ruling as “very vague and subjective.”
The meeting among search engine officials and the data protection authorities (DPAs) was to get input for further guidelines in an aim to ensure a consistent implementation of the take-down ruling on the part of the search engine providers as well as consistent handling of complaints lodged with the authorities by people whose requests were denied.
The DPAs want to avoid a situation where confusion about the ruling could lead to a large number of complaints that they would have to deal with. Google said at the meeting that it has refused about 30 percent of requests. So far, the search engine has received 91,000 take-down requests concerning 328,000 links to Web addresses. About 15 percent of requests prompted Google to ask additional information. Over half of all requests have been granted.
About the Author
Matt Holden is an Associate Content Editor for 1105 Media, Inc. He received his MFA and BA in journalism from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. He currently writes and edits for Occupational Health & Safety magazine, and Security Today.