back to article Surprise! Google chairman blasts EU's privacy ruling

Google's chairman Eric Schmidt has attacked judges in the European Union's top court, who ruled earlier this week that the ad giant can be held responsible for the type of personal data that appears on its results pages. The multinational was shocked by the decision, which - in effect - ordered Google to respect existing …

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  1. Matt 21

    So the attack has started

    The BBC are reporting that a paedophile and a dodgy politician are trying to get their details removed. I wonder where that information came from.

    Of course Google are going to try and whip up opposition with false claims like this. However, I don't see anything in the judgement that means these two examples would have to be removed.

    1. Lionel Baden

      Re: So the attack has started

      why false ???

      1. DavCrav

        Re: So the attack has started

        "why false ???"

        Google has leaked the most outrageous ones they were given, or potentially outright made them up. Since there's no proof a paedophile has asked to have (probably) his history sanitised, I'm going to default to Google making stuff up to try to whip up a Daily Mail frenzy. Qui bono is a reasonable way of deciding probabilities.

        1. Lionel Baden

          Re: So the attack has started

          @DavCrav

          Google has leaked the most outrageous ones they were given, or potentially outright made them up. Since there's no proof a paedophile has asked to have (probably) his history sanitised, I'm going to default to Google making stuff up to try to whip up a Daily Mail frenzy. Qui bono is a reasonable way of deciding probabilities.

          So you also have no idea that their false, your just saying they are to make you sound more credulous !!!

          Pot & Kettle ??

        2. jaduncan

          Re: So the attack has started

          "Qui bono is a reasonable way of deciding probabilities."

          When you say it that way it sounds much better than 'intellectually lazy ad hom'.

    2. Velv
      Childcatcher

      Re: So the attack has started

      The paedophile and the dodgy politician are only asking for certain aspects of their history to be removed, not everything about them. In other words they are attempting to censure the truth.

      If someone wants to be "forgotten" and have absolutely ZERO presence on the Internet, then perhaps there should be a mechanism. But to be permitted to selectively choose what's being listed - I don't think that's what the EU intended, and it opens the world to huge risk of misinformation.

    3. Richard Jones 1
      Unhappy

      Re: So the attack has started

      You missed the several censured surgeons who would like it if you could not find out about the death rates they achieved when others achieved success rates.

      If there is a stupid social (antisocial?) but non criminal act, in other words a fool showing them to be foolish, the right to be forgotten might just be reasonable. If it is someone committing an act that reflects on others to their detriment or is a reflection of an official record, can someone explain where and why there is a right be have this record discarded? I thought that was what the CRB does,or is supposed to do though sadly often quite badly.

      Will the CRB have to shut up shop as it is affecting criminals ability to have a professional life?

      1. 's water music

        Re: So the attack has started

        One would hope the surgeons of death have already been censured regardless of any censorship issues (sorry)

        Interestingly you knock your straw-man over before he is even erected. There is no right to have anything and everything removed from Google search results. You still have to go through due process to decide whether the public interest is served by removing a particular piece of information from search results.

        What has changed is that when a court agrees and Google says "FU the search bit of Google is out of your jurisdiction", the court can apply penalties to the ad-sales bit of Google that is in its jurisdiction.

        I have no doubt that Google will be hit by a new wave of internet loons asking for all sorts to be suppressed but I suspect that this will not be an entirely new experience for them and that the sky will not fall on our heads.

        1. big_D Silver badge

          Re: So the attack has started

          Balance: there has to be a balance, and that is defined in the privacy laws here.

          The information has to be inaccurate, irrelevant or no longer relevant (among others) before it can removed. That means that if you were declared backrupt 2 decades ago, that is no longer relevant and should not show up when people do a search trying to work out if you are credit worthy (the current case), because there is a legal statute that says how long such information can be held against you.

          A paedophile or dodgy politician is another matter, the latter is also a public person, so has less right to privacy than a private citizen. If they feel they are being unjustly ridiculed, they can sue under existing liable laws, but it wouldn't fall under data protection laws.

          1. strum

            Re: So the attack has started

            >Balance: there has to be a balance, and that is defined in the privacy laws here.

            Yes. There's a lot of nonsense being spouted on both sides of this argument.

            Laws apply - on the internet or off it. Maybe the laws are wrong - but, if so, they always were; they didn't suddenly become wrong when Google got involved.

    4. Psyx

      Re: So the attack has started

      "Of course Google are going to try and whip up opposition with false claims like this. "

      I find that a bit of a push and a rather empty allegation. there's no basis for it.

      Google don't need to make it up. They just need to cherry pick.

      Out of the few thousand requests that have come through, a few are going to be unsavoury people. They just highlight those and let the media do the rest.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: So the attack has started

      Is that 1 or 2 people?

  2. /\/\j17

    An unnamed source, presumably from within Google, told Reuters that the company will need to assemble an "army of removal experts" in the 28 nations across the EU to deal with the requests.

    Or to spin it the other way - this judgement will lead to the creation of hundreads of new jobs, helping boost the economic recovery across the EU!

    1. NogginTheNog

      Jobs in the EU

      I imagine they'll all be based in Ireland, but registered in some tax haven somewhere in the ether...

    2. Psyx

      Fortunately, Google have a fuckton of cash and can afford it.

      cry me a river, richboys.

      1. Daggerchild Silver badge

        "Fortunately, Google have a fuckton of cash and can afford it. cry me a river, richboys."

        You sure the law only applies to Google?

        1. John Lilburne

          It applies to all data controllers and Google are no exception.

          1. Daggerchild Silver badge

            "It applies to all data controllers and Google are no exception."

            Thing was, Google didn't know they *were* a data controller of people's identities in search results :) It was all text until then. Now some of the text is illegal, and they will never know in advance what text that will be. Funny definition of Control if you can't tell what it is you're Controlling :)

            I wonder who else doesn't know they're now a data controller according to this new interpretation.

            "Warning, May Contain Names"

        2. big_D Silver badge

          @Daggerchild exactly, it covers every website, not just Google.

          The difference is that most already comply with the law.

        3. Psyx

          "You sure the law only applies to Google?"

          No, but I'm still finding hard to wring out sympathy for companies that make a shedload of cash out of our personal data with the bare minimum amount of oversight or regulation.

    3. Daggerchild Silver badge

      "Or to spin it the other way - this judgement will lead to the creation of hundreads of new jobs, helping boost the economic recovery across the EU"

      Jobs for people versed in balancing data protection vs public interest for each and every case as each one they deny will automatically raise an accusation of not obeying the EU law.

      i.e. Everyone has to hire *more Lawyers*.

    4. Anonymous Cowerd
      Facepalm

      There will be no new jobs because it will cost them money.

      Instead, they'll just automate the removal process.

      Then we'll have people deleting anything they don't like.

  3. ADJB

    And this is a problem why?

    If this ruling applies to the EU why don't Google et al just stop using there, for example, .uk and .de domains and run everything through the .com (which I assume is based in the US) where the ruling doesn't apply?.

    At the very least they could put a disclaimer up saying EU based domains will give censored results and for full results use the .com. I would assume they could also give more precedence to the fact a take down notice has been requested and refer people to chilling effects for further details.

    Beware the Streisand effect.

    1. wowfood

      Re: And this is a problem why?

      Because as we have learnt from the US. the .blah doesn't matter ,anything that can be accessed from location X can be held accountable from location X.

      Well, that's what 'Murica seem to be doing, if google take that approach it won't be long until the EU does the same. That and it'd slow down search since you'd be searching from the US, rather than a local datacenter.

      1. Lionel Baden

        Re: And this is a problem why?

        thought all the traffic got routed over there anyway :)

    2. DavCrav

      Re: And this is a problem why?

      "If this ruling applies to the EU why don't Google et al just stop using there [sic], for example, .uk and .de domains and run everything through the .com (which I assume is based in the US) where the ruling doesn't apply?."

      The ruling applies to Google the company, not google.co.uk. If they withdraw completely from the EU then that's fine, they can do that, but while they want to do business in the EU they need to abide by the EU's laws, even those they don't like as it will cause them hassle.

      And as for beware the Streisand effect, if Google publicise that so-and-so has exercised their right to be forgotten, please plaster it everywhere, they will find themselves in court again for contempt. Contempt of court is in some sense the most serious crime in the country, in the sense that the punishment for it is essentially unlimited.

  4. Immenseness
    Pint

    Interesting struggle

    Who should be in charge of interpreting what the law should be? A court with jurisdiction over the area concerned, or a commercial company based in another continent.

    Popcorn and a beer anyone?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Interesting struggle

      Mario Costeja Gonzalez would prefer paella and Sangria

      ***oops it seems that was a link to an old article, and he would just like a glass of water please

  5. Brent Longborough
    Big Brother

    Forget-me-not

    "The Right to be Forgotten" is BS for Whingers, or worse.

    If it's on the internet, it'll be found, with or without Google search

    The right place to attack this, first, is to look at when and how it gets published in the first place

    The next best place to sort it out is at the website that's publishing it, not breaking Google search

    Rewriting history is dangerous. Mario Costeja Gonzalez *may* have the "right to be forgotten", but Bashar al-Assad definitely doesn't. Now, where do you draw the line in between?

    1. 's water music

      Re: Forget-me-not

      where do you draw the line

      In a court?

    2. Tom 38

      Re: Forget-me-not

      There is no right to be forgotten, there is the right to privacy (of the individual) and the contrasting right of free speech (of google). This judgement solely means that in circumstances where the two rights are in conflict, the court has the power to decide which right must be upheld, in that specific circumstance.

      Google will not need an army of anything, since before anything will be forced to be removed by them, a court has first agreed.

      1. Pete 2 Silver badge

        Re: Forget-me-not - Not!

        > the contrasting right of free speech (of google)

        Google (Inc.) is a company. There is no "right of free speech" for anything except people - and even for people, everywhere, that right is strictly limited.

        There are, however, many aspects of freely available information that are in the public interest to be available. I would suggest that as long as the Rehabilitation of Offenders act is adhered to (some offences can be ignored after a given period - a "right to be forgotten" enshrined in law), that a person's serious criminal activity (i.e. not littering or similar), once proven, was in the public interest to be searchable.

        However lapses of judgement, bad luck or accidental events: such as being in debt, drunken selfies or the like aren't really that serious (if embarrassing) and shouldn't be removable. Though I can see a strong case for _anything_ done, said or posted in childhood being forgotten automatically. We have all done silly things in our youth. We don't need reminding of them.

        The difficulty is that the RoO act was written before the internet and this sort of thing seems to be a case of the internet (well: Google) being unwilling to catch up with our laws.

  6. ukgnome
    Mushroom

    What bugs me

    Where will this erosion of history finish?

    You can't just go around deleting history, now if it turns out that the search result in any way is false then fair enough. Surely we have to be a bit responsible for our actions.

    Is the idiot driver that killed my brother-in-law going to ask for that court filing to be removed, because Nigel is dead and it was a few years ago? Why should it be removed?

    Should that picture of me with the two strippers and the big bag of surf be expunged because I want to work in finance?

    It's not up to the EU to make the rules, and what about all the other search engines? Won't this stop development of other browsers because it's suddenly got more expensive? And then what about data that isn't stored in the EU but involves an EU citizen?

    Clearly it's not workable, and clearly this stupid decision needs challenging.

    1. Psyx

      Re: What bugs me

      "You can't just go around deleting history"

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damnatio_memoriae

      Bets?

    2. Captain Hogwash

      Re: "strippers ... surf ... finance"

      Welcome on board. You'll fit right in.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: What bugs me

      Actually, that is exactly why we do have governments etc.: to make the rules. If we each make our own, or leave it to private firms ....

      Google or Bing or some other automated system run by, somewhere, people, has got no special privileges just to satisfy our prurience. Try publishing someone's ancient peccadilloes in a newspaper and see how acceptable that is.

      I do not think the EU decision is suggesting a carte blanche right to have anything you like removed under all circumstances. Personal freedom is not just yours to pry; it is also mine not to have strangers using or misusing data about me that may be true, false or misleading. In Britain now there are still high-profile court cases involving newspapers prying into emails, SMSs and telephone conversations because it is generally accepted that this is not right, no matter how famous or insignificant one is.

      I read it as genuinely public information, such as non-expired criminal records, is fine. Getting the partial and misleading details of some long expired civil case, that could blight a life for no good reason many years later, is not.

      Should a potential or actual employer or just some nosey busibody be able to look at the messy details of your divorce? Even writers of references are restricted in what they can say, to stop wilful harm.

      Your life may be blameless or your sins so egregious that you are beyond caring. For the rest of us, privacy is important, whether it is merely because I have a bizarre reading taste or keep three mistresses and a boyfriend on the side. No doubt there will be hard cases. But, hard cases make bad law and they certainly do not justify the loss of personal freedom and rights to a private life that the opponents support.

      Why would the opinion of Google carry any weight? It is just a private, advertising company making money out of other peoples lives and intellectual property.

  7. Eradicate all BB entrants

    What's to stop it being .....

    ...... indexed again? Removing the results is one thing, bespoke scraping of the sites after removal is another. Also what about all of the other search engines? When Yandex tell the EU/whomever to stick the request up their asses what is the EU going to do about it?

    It is a stupid stupid idea. Instead, why not have the courts remove it from the site it was indexed on, then have the site request Google take down the results? If there is no legal obligation to remove it from the site (criminal convictions are public records), then there should be no obligation to remove it from search results.

  8. Nigel Brown

    Other search engines are available....

    ...as my local BBC radio station keeps telling us.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Where's the fire?

    Reading El Reg with regard to this, it is my understanding that an individual must first go through the courts in their host country before it gets a smack down at Google.

    Anyone care to clarify please?

    1. diodesign (Written by Reg staff) Silver badge

      Re: Where's the fire?

      "an individual must first go through the courts"

      It's explained here.

      C.

      1. Psyx

        Re: Where's the fire?

        Someone didn't like the clear and useful reply, it seems!

        Have an upvote, to counter the idiotic downvote.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Guessing this also aplies to other inferior search engines too?

    It's also interesting that even people without a vested interest in search are saying this will be overturned pretty quickly, once the wider implications come to light...

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Good news

    "An unnamed source, presumably from within Google, told Reuters that the company will need to assemble an 'army of removal experts' in the 28 nations across the EU to deal with the requests"

    Well it's not as if they were short of money, sounds like an opportunity to increase the employment of some EU citizens.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Good news

      " employment of some EU citizen"

      So many people in EU waiting for someone else to build a company and employ their lazy asses?

      If it weren't for the revenue source, I'd tell Google to shut down its sites in the EU and let the EU citizens build their own damn search engine or live with Bing or Yahoo. Better yet, let them build their own search engine. Why are they so incapable of doing things on their own?

      Too many comments inferring it's up to Google to employ EU citizens. Seems pretty damn pathetic that they (EU Citizens) can't build their own company or fend for themselves. Let them eat cake.

  12. Kay Burley ate my hamster

    What Google are forgetting

    Google are not the Internet, removal from Google isn't removal from the Internet. This is not a free speech issue.

    1. Scoular

      Re: What Google are forgetting

      US law does not actually apply everywhere.

      Other sovereign countries have their own laws as is their right and these may differ from US law.

      If the US has the right to enforce its own laws in their own jurisdiction then other countries surely have equal right to enforce their laws in their own countries.

      The US and US citizens often act as if they not only should but do control the world. Other countries do not accept that.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: What Google are forgetting

        Then build your own damn search engines and build your own companies to employ EU Citizens.

        Don't criticize how your FREE meal was prepared if all you did was sit down after someone else prepared it for you.

        Stupid Arrogance abounds by people who haven't built/done anything themselves IMO.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I've always hated all that content Google produces, going round town writing bad things about people. It's about time they were held to account for their lies

    /sarcasm

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mario Costeja Gonzalez has not been forgotten, the original newspaper article is still there.

    I love the idea of a newspaper article being in the public interest, but it not being in the public interest to be able to find said article.... someone needs to have a word with the judges about the logic they apply to reach judgements.

  15. bpfh
    Boffin

    An interesting problem...

    You are asking google to remove personal data that it scrapes from other sources, so Google dereferences it, but at the same time, tracking down the information you wanted to have taken down will get harder, and in the end it's still online to anyone who wants to search - and Google is not the only search engine or directory out there.

    If Google is obligated by law to respect a personal data takedown request, there is a nice way of doing this with a feedback loop: Create a special series of search results which will tell you what site contains the information they are displaying. From there, you can either contact that site directly, and as soon as the source data is removed, Google will drop it from the index within a week or so automatically following subsequent crawls and not finding the data, and if the offending site does not respect the takedown request, get back to the user informing them that the offending site has not respected their wishes. It has been marked as "do not include" in the search results (so that following a plain delete, google does not reindex the page again, and can drop it as soon as the crawler no longer finds the offending content), but the content is still publicly available on Internet at the following address(es), and provide the whois data for that domain to let the user take it up directly with the offending hostmaster...

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