Users are asking Google to delete their data – 1000 requests per day

They are thus taking advantage of the relevant decision made by the Court of Justice of the EU in May, according to which everyone has the right to demand the deletion of data that is "outdated, irrelevant or inaccurate" in order to "clean up" their online profile.

From May 30, when the deletion began, to June 30, that is, in just one month, the requests to Google have been made at an average rate of about 1,000 per day and concern an average of 3.8 links per user request. Most requests have been made in France (about 14,100), followed by Germany (12,700) and the UK (8,500). It remains unclear how many of the approximately 70,000 deletion requests have already been granted.

However, this development has already had side effects and has sparked accusations of "backdoor censorship", as Google proceeds to delete certain articles, something that their authors themselves find objectionable, such as BBC financial editors, who protested strongly because their article from 2007, which concerned the former chairman of the investment firm Merrill Lynch, Stan O'Neill, disappeared from the popular search engine.

Several other British newspaper articles have been similarly removed, including the Guardian, which reported that links to six of its older articles have now been removed. The newspaper said Google gave it no explanation for the removal, nor the ability to reverse the decision.

Among the articles that "disappeared" were news about a scandal involving a referee in the British championship, about a couple caught having sex on a train and about a Muslim who accused the airline Cathay Pacific of not hiring him because of his name.

The media is informed by Google about the removal, but without knowing the identity of the person who requested the deletion (at least not yet).

"These examples show how stupid the right to be forgotten is. It's the equivalent of going to the libraries and burning the books you don't like," said Martin Clark, editor of the major news website Mail Online, which has also fallen victim to "disappeared" articles.

Google said that each request to "forget" someone or something will be reviewed on an individual basis and a decision will be made as to whether it meets the criteria of the European Court of Justice's ruling, according to Agence France-Presse, the BBC, the New York Times and the Guardian.

A European Commission spokesperson commented, on behalf of Vice-President Neelie Kroes, that removing the BBC article from search results was "not a good decision", as it did not appear to be justified on the basis of any "reasonable public interest".

As he said, the point of the court decision is not to allow people to "Photoshop their lives" (i.e. to "edit" their infamy, as they see fit). The "disappearance" is only visible in Europe, while if someone does the same online search (e.g. for a person) from the US via the Google.com address, the "forgotten" links appear normally.

Also, the articles have not stopped appearing on the websites of the same media outlets that originally published them. Google's share of searches in Europe is 85% to 90%, while in the US it is below 70%.

Source: defencenet.gr