EU Court of Justice Paves Way For "Right To Be Forgotten" Online

We'll always have magnetic tape by ObsessiveMathsFreak · 2014-05-13 00:49 · Score: 3, Insightful

Paris may forget you cheri, but marketers never will.

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May the Maths Be with you!

Definitely good, but there are two sides by scsirob · 2014-05-13 00:51 · Score: 2

I can't help wonder what happens is a person who wants to be forgotten is referred to by someone else. Removing search results regarding some particular person may mean unintentional removal of content that someone else created and want visible.

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To Terminate, or not to Terminate, that's the question - SCSIROB

Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by Xest · 2014-05-13 01:13 · Score: 5, Informative

There's been a lot of FUD and confusion about this particular law on Slashdot, some people seem to think you can just somehow use your bat signal to say "I want to be forgotten on everything online ever!" but it's more simplistic than that.
What it does, is gives you the right to go to a company, that is storing information on you, and ask that they remove it. Nothing more, nothing less. That means if Google has indexed search results and their index includes information on you they simply have to remove that from their index - they do not have to go to the sites they indexed and asked them to remove the information too or any such thing, it's up to you to contact each specific company and the company must oblige.
This isn't really as big a deal as often made out, there was an argument you already had this right to an extent in many jurisdictions such as under the data protection act in the UK, which states that companies may not be passed information on you without your consent, so unless you gave it to them in the first place or consented to someone else giving it to them then they shouldn't be holding it regardless.
This law just formalises that and makes it clear that that remains true even in the age of user generated content, it simply makes it clear that companies can't shirk their data protection rules by saying "but a user gave us that content!" or "but a machine gathered that information!".
I don't believe this creates the hardship that it's claimed it creates, if companies were adhering to the likes of the UK's data protection act in the first place (which stems back to 1998) then they should've had procedures in place for over a decade and a half now to delete personal details that they had no legal right to hold.
If there are concerns about other content being deleted at the same time then that's not a problem with the law, but entirely a problem with how companies choose to go about eliminating data that should no longer be held.
If I have entered no agreement with a company, if a company is not acting as a data processor for a data controller I do have an agreement, and if I have not myself passed personal data to a company, then they never had a legal right (apart from under a handful of very specific exceptions) to hold it in the first place. The only extension this adds is that it makes it clear that you can also retroactively have information removed even if they did have the right to hold it in the past - even this existed in the likes of the DPA though, that companies shouldn't hold it for longer than necessary for the agreed purpose or when a data subject has ceased their relationship with the firm. The problem with that part it was never explicit as to exactly how long a company could hold data on you after that point so it was down to a fairly arbitrary decision by a court.
Honestly, I don't see the problem, if a company doesn't have control of the data it owns to be able to delete data it shouldn't hold on request then it's not fit to be holding any kind of data in the first place.
Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by Raenex · 2014-05-13 02:51 · Score: 4, Informative

What it does, is gives you the right to go to a company, that is storing information on you, and ask that they remove it. Nothing more, nothing less. That means if Google has indexed search results and their index includes information on you they simply have to remove that from their index - they do not have to go to the sites they indexed and asked them to remove the information too or any such thing, it's up to you to contact each specific company and the company must oblige.
Oh, is that all? So the data is still there, except the most popular search engine on the planet can't list it. Wow, that's a relief. Here I thought there was censorship of public information going on, but clearly there isn't. (For the impaired, yes, this is sarcasm.)
From the article:

The case itself occurred after a Spanish man (Mario Costeja Gonzalez) complained that the detail of an auction notice for his former home, which was repossessed after he failed to pay his taxes, appeared in Google's search results.
The notice itself was made public on the third-party website (twice via a newspaper called La Vanguardia) and Mr Gonzalez wanted the source material edited and the Google result removed because the proceedings concerning him had been fully resolved for a number of years, thus he felt as though the reference to them was now "entirely irrelevant".
Mercifully the Spanish Data Protection Agency (AEPD) rejected the complaint against La Vanguardia, which correctly ruled that the information in question had been lawfully published by it. But the AEPD then ruled that Google should still delete the related references to the page, which Google perhaps understandably viewed as unfair because the information was already in the public domain, and so began the court battle until today's ECJ verdict.
Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by Raenex · 2014-05-13 04:14 · Score: 4, Insightful

Newspapers have long been deemed to be public record, and so of course it shouldn't be censored. Public record can comfortably sit behind the public interest defence. But Google is a business that makes money providing services based on public record, that does not in itself make it public record, and so it becomes difficult for it to make a case for public interest - it's tried to make this case and failed, hence the ruling.
This argument is absurd. Newspapers (when not state run) are also commercial interests. One entity publishes things in the public record, and another makes those things searchable. To argue that what Google does is so different and doesn't deserve protection is preposterous, even more so to claim that there isn't censorship going on.
Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by AmiMoJo · 2014-05-13 05:18 · Score: 3, Informative

In the EU simply because some information is public does not mean it's free for all commercial entities to use. For example, if a crime is considered spent (usually some time after punishment ends the guilty party no longer has to declare it to employers) then an employer can't just go looking back through the newspaper archives for the stories reporting it. You can't set up an agency that records crimes and reports them to employers for a fee, even if they are considered legally spent. The information is public, anyone who kept a copy or who can be bothered to visit the library and scan through microfiche can find it, but that doesn't give them a right to use it commercially without that person's consent.
You have to remember that in the EU corporations are not people. They don't get the same freedoms and rights that people do.

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const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by Xest · 2014-05-13 05:26 · Score: 2

Newspapers report on and record current events, they're a record of facts based on the perspective of the paper in question, and they can be sued for libel if they get it wrong and forced to print corrections.
In contrast, Google has none of this. Would your preference instead be that Google's search facilities are declared public record but it can be sued for libel for everything wrong it indexes about someone? How else do you suggest dealing with incorrect or irrelevant information that is harmful to an individual that is prominent enough to cause them real actual problems?
Okay there is censorship going on, but there's always censorship going on. Using censorship as a go to argument against everything is one of the worst fallacies Slashdot is prone to. There isn't a society on earth that is censorship free, not even the US. As much as some people like to scream this fantasy that they live in a censorship free world and the world would be perfect without censorship it's a nonsense, sometimes it's a necessary evil. The problem with censorship isn't that it exists, it's how it's used. Saying something is censorship doesn't automatically make it bad, being able to censor your troops ability to blab their tactics and positions to the enemy via Twitter is a good thing. So you don't get to magically win an argument by saying "OMG CENSORSHIP" you need to explain why this particular instance of censorship is bad. You need to explain, given an understanding of the law in question - such as the intricacies of the public interest defence and so forth what the problem is exactly with it.
Unless you can come back and tell me why Google should be able to profit from spreading false information and have no obligation to correct or remove then you don't have an argument. What is exceptional about internet companies? everyone else is bound by such law in one way or another, what makes a company like Google special that it should be above the law on issues like this? Again, would you prefer that Google is instead just subject to libel laws like print media and so forth? I know I wouldn't. This law is far far better.
Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by Xest · 2014-05-13 05:51 · Score: 2

Yep exactly. As I pointed out in another post credit reference agencies are the perfect example as they've long been living by the standards Google is now being asked to because they were historically one of those with a data protection act exemption.
The problem is a new one because historically most businesses have had absolutely fuck all reason to gather people's embarrassing data and the data protection act made it clear they had no right to as well. The law hasn't played catch up on the internet, but credit reference agencies have long been able to gather personal data without the permission of the data subject however, as you point out, they can still only hold public data like CCJs and pass it on to their clients (i.e. banks doing credit checks) for I believe 7 years in the UK, even though it'll be in public record forever.
As I've been saying all along this isn't a new thing, the only thing that's new is that the law has been clarified to make it clear to companies like Google who think they're special and above the law that they're not. They've been riding a wave of "user generated content" and "automatically generated content" to try and pretend that as a company that somehow exempts them from data protection law, which is a complete farce.
Re:Definitely good, but there are two sides by Xest · 2014-05-13 08:42 · Score: 2

"Yet you hold that this same "public record" information cannot be indexed by a search engine."
But it's just not being indexed, unless you get the definition of data processor as in data protection law then I don't know how else I can explain to you why this is different. There's a specific legal definition, and Google falls foul of it. It's not a farce, a farce would be allowing internet companies like Google to keep being a special case that does not have to adhere to data protection law whilst everyone else in the real world does.
"And really, censorship is the one of the worst fallacies on Slashdot?"
Yes really. It's used like a word that we're automatically supposed to say "Oh well, Reanex said it was censorship so he automatically wins the argument and is right". Yes that's a fucking fallacy, and a very tired one on Slashdot.
"Gee, that freedom of speech, so unimportant, hardly worth consideration! "
And there you go with the fallacy again. Freedom of speech isn't unimportant, but there's not a single jurisdiction on the planet that doesn't impose restrictions on it. The problem is you're arbitrarily ignoring existing restrictions and saying any new ones are automatically wrong. Why? What makes your restrictions right and everyone else's wrong? It's not like freedom of speech has ever been an absolute and is now suddenly being altered, it's just that an existing long established restriction (i.e. limitation of speech that breaches an individuals privacy with no public interest defence) is being clarified as relevant to internet companies despite them thinking they're different, and it's not like there is some pre-existing grand dictation from some power up high about what is and isn't acceptable. It's arbitrary and no one person gets to dictate the value of it or what it should include - society does that, and that's exactly what is happening here. This law is actually very popular amongst the general public because people value privacy over and above the right to breach privacy.
So it's not even a new type of censorship, it's just clarification that yes, the law applies to everyone. Your censorship argument is pretty weak and as I said, it's populist nonsense. You're crying censorship under the pretence it's an absolute that is now only just being violated, it's not, it never has been.
"See, now this is one of the worst arguments on Slashdot. Your classic strawman."
So I guess you can't actually justify it then given that you're dodging the bullet with another classic cry of "strawman" without apparently understanding what that even means? If you knew what it meant then you'd spot the almost comical irony in your use of it - your strawman is a strawman, designed to distract from the fact that you couldn't answer the question. If it wasn't born of stupidity it'd be comic genius.
Your argument thus far boils down to the idea that freedom of speech trumps all, your view must therefore logically be that no one should have a secret card pin, password, non-public finances, private sexuality, private contact details and so on. If I ask you for all these things will you post them? if not then why are you engaging in censorship? If you think that censorship is okay for you in this case, in refusing to make every detail I have asked for about your life public then why is it not okay for someone else who has had those details posted against their will publicly to similarly censor?
I really don't think you've thought your argument through unless you can justify why your details should remain secret, but others should not also enjoy that right if it's been taken away from them against their will.

pure political bullshit by Connie_Lingus · 2014-05-13 00:54 · Score: 2, Insightful

so by the wave of legislator's arms, all information about us online is simply going to disappear?

i call shenanigans.

i mean really...do these people surf the same web as i do?

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never bring a twinkie to a food fight.

Re:pure political bullshit by QuasiSteve · 2014-05-13 01:01 · Score: 4, Informative

You could try reading TFS, if not TFA.
They specifically point out that even if Site X has a legitimate reason to have that personal information online, it does not automatically mean that Service Y (in this case, Google), has a legitimate reason to process that data in the ways they do.
Site X will still be available. It might not be easy to find it, of course, but cue the "the internet routes around censorship" mantra.
Re:pure political bullshit by Connie_Lingus · 2014-05-13 01:12 · Score: 4, Interesting

so legislators are going to start deciding what public information search companies are able to aggregate?
uhhh....no thanks...ill opt out of that reality.

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never bring a twinkie to a food fight.
Re:pure political bullshit by Xest · 2014-05-13 01:29 · Score: 2

"so by the wave of legislator's arms, all information about us online is simply going to disappear?"
No, but upon receipt of a formal request it's not unreasonable to expect that companies have control of the data they display on the internet and can hence delete it from their services. Because this is what it's actually about, not some fanciful idea of being able to declare in some unspecified place that all information about you on the internet should vanish, an idea that seems to have been magicked up in the minds of some Slashdotters but bears no resemblance to what this law actually says and does.
Honestly, if companies can make a profit off of harvesting and displaying personal details, often against the will of the person in question, then it's really not too much to ask that when the subject asks for it to be removed that they do so. If someone breaks into your house and steals your personal photos, financial records, and whatever else and posts it all online and Google harvests it up with it's automated systems and makes a bit of money from ad impressions for people that stumble across it I don't think it's really a lot to ask that you also have the right to tell them to delete it the fuck off their servers when you find it too.
There's only a spurious argument that they had any legal basis to harvest this data in the first place given that doing so is a breach of most nation's data protection laws, so it's even less to ask that they implement procedures to make themselves compliant with long established existing data protection law.
Which is really all this does. So no, these people don't use the same web you do. They use the web where they actually read TFA, understand the issues, know what's practical, fair, and possible, and know what they're on about.
Re:pure political bullshit by Xest · 2014-05-13 01:50 · Score: 3, Insightful

No, not correct. It's about personal data. This is already something that's well defined and well understood.
Your argument amounts to the idea that nothing should ever be private, which is an even more stupid idea.
Re:pure political bullshit by Connie_Lingus · 2014-05-13 01:52 · Score: 2

its all just government censorship....don't you see that??
the promise of the internet has always been information wants to free.
man, slashdot is changing nowadays...i can't believe that i am even debating this point on this particular forum...wow.

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never bring a twinkie to a food fight.
Re:pure political bullshit by Xest · 2014-05-13 02:14 · Score: 4, Insightful

Slashdot has always supported the idea that information wants to be free, but it's also supported the idea that privacy matters.
It's also true that not all information should be free, most people don't want their password, debit card pin, or private conversations to be "free".
I mean, what is your argument, that everything the NSA and GCHQ did is fine, and of course they should be able to follow your every conversation, because of course, information wants to be free? I mean why shouldn't GCHQ and the NSA hold all your information, information wants to be free, it wants them to know everything about us!
Should Slashdot remove Anonymous Coward and make everyone post with their real names, because we should all get to know who exactly they are, because information wants to be free? Maybe you should have to publicly post your address and telephone number and e-mail and workplace details and salary too. Are you willing to put your money where you mouth is and make a start?
Yes information wants to be free, except when we're talking about privacy, and privacy concerns should trump that.
Re:pure political bullshit by AmiMoJo · 2014-05-13 04:03 · Score: 2

so legislators are going to start deciding what public information search companies are able to aggregate?
Yes. In the past if you had a criminal conviction it might have been written about in the paper. Years later you have served your time and the conviction is spent, do you don't have to tell employers about it. That helps reformed criminals who have not re-offended to re-integrate into society. The only way and employer could find out is to go to a library and scan through tens of thousands of microfiche looking for your name by hand.
Now Google will pull up that news site article from 1998 in a few clicks. The original intent of having a conviction spent in the eyes of the law has been subverted (unintentionally), so the law needs to be updated.

--
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Re:pure political bullshit by houghi · 2014-05-13 05:13 · Score: 2

I want to opt out of them gathering MY data. That is not possible now.
And this is not about just putting a robot.txt on my website.
And limiting companies in favour of people? Yes please. If there is a choice between people and companies, governements should pick the people each and every time. They are made by the people, for the people.
Hey: "For the people. By the people." could be a great motto for a governement.

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Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.

cool by Charliemopps · 2014-05-13 01:01 · Score: 3, Funny

Donald Sterling's going to love this.

Re:Censorship by GoddersUK · 2014-05-13 01:12 · Score: 4, Informative

This isn't about defamatory material. This is about matters of historical/public record. This case was brought by someone who wanted records of bankruptcy proceedings against him removed. That's not libel nor slander. It's a public record. Similarly a German court blocked a guy who was trying to get records of a previous court judgement or prosecution (I don't recall which) against him removed from a newspaper website. http://www.theguardian.com/com...

Re:Censorship by plover · 2014-05-13 01:19 · Score: 2

But why is this Google's problem? It's not their data.

This kind of shit is impossible. You're going to get all kinds of censorship as a result: clams bitching about xenu, etc.

Google should repay the EU in kind by blocking all search results pertaining to a complainant: every document mentioning the person should be removed from all indices returned to EU locations. When they discover just how stupid their ruling was, too bad.

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John

Re:Mario Costeja González by locofungus · 2014-05-13 01:26 · Score: 3, Informative

The EU does cherish freedom of speech. But it also cherishes the privacy of the individual.

The US - based on comments on this site - appears to have decided that freedom of speech trumps everything else. You can lie, cheat, shout fire in a crowded theatre, call in fake bomb scares, basically anything at all because it's all "freedom of speech."

The EU takes a much more nuanced view. Sometimes there's an overwhelming reason why freedom of speech should trump privacy. Sometimes privacy should trump freedom of speech, and sometimes it's a grey area that has to be litigated through the courts.

In this particular case, the court hasn't ruled that the information has to disappear - all they've ruled is that google (and presumably other search engines) need to give people the right to remove search results about themselves.

Most things are "allowed to be forgotten" in most circumstances. So, for example, most employers aren't allowed to ask "have you ever been made bankrupt?" although I think they can ask "are you an undischarged bankrupt". Google is allowing employers to sidestep the protective regulations that were built into bankruptcy law before the internet existed. The EU is now merely trying to reinstate them.

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God said, "div D = rho, div B = 0, curl E = -@B/@t, curl H = J + @D/@t," and there was light.

Multuple cases of abuse by single people by gurps_npc · 2014-05-13 01:30 · Score: 2

There are cases where a disgruntled X does nasty things - from posting nude photos of women to falsely claiming a man was arrested for molesting a child.

Not to mention numerous cases of old, bad information, such as bankruptcy, actual arrest records, etc.

Worst of all there are several companies who exist solely to blackmail individuals into paying to remove negative information. All totally legal in some jurisdictions.

This is a good law we need it.

P.S. Someone mentioned companies and/or other large organizations using it. They already get the same thing done by paying large amounts of money to lawyers to sue people for 'copyright' infringement over videos of them committing crimes.

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excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com

Protected class by tepples · 2014-05-13 01:36 · Score: 2

In practice, that would require legislation in each jurisdiction to recognize former debtors as a protected class under equal employment opportunity law.

Re:Censorship by StripedCow · 2014-05-13 01:37 · Score: 3, Funny

I actually agree with this decision and if google removes all references to me I wouldn't mind in the least (they have very little anyway);

Are you serious? When I do a google search for "Anonymous Coward", it returns quite some hits.

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If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.

Re:Censorship by fafaforza · 2014-05-13 01:45 · Score: 4, Insightful

Does Lexis-Nexis get sued because they index libelous articles?

Otherside of Right to be Forgotten by HockeyPuck · 2014-05-13 01:57 · Score: 2

is the Right to be Tracked.

If I want to call up $company and tell them "delete everything you know about me from your index." This implies that without asking them, I've granted them the ability to track me.

This also puts quite a burden on me to call them up and say, "Hey, I just joined BowlingLeague.com as user StrikesAPlenty, please delete me from your index.

Also, how do you prove that a given user really is you? Your name probably isn't that unique. Which "Bob Smith" are you?

Re:Otherside of Right to be Forgotten by dublin · 2014-05-13 10:06 · Score: 2

This is the really scary aspect of this decision, and it seems to be lost on most of the commenters here -
In order for Google (or any other provider of information services) to even putatively be *able* to delete all information they have regarding you, they first have to have all information about and relating to you tagged with your identity.
This effectively means they must (by law) keep an auditable log of everything you ever do on the net.
What could possibly go wrong with that? I'm telling you, Hitler and Stalin only dreamed of the power that big governments and big corporations will have to monitor, control, and even "disappear" us in the very near future...

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"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last ./ post

Re:Censorship by Br00se · 2014-05-13 02:28 · Score: 2

Google takes data and makes it searchable - that's not public record, as soon as you take data from public record and make it searchable then it's not public record any more. That's why Google lost this case, and quite rightly so.

You don't "take" data from the public record, you "share" data from the public record. It doesn't stop being part of the public record just because it gets republished.

Re:Censorship by Xest · 2014-05-13 03:10 · Score: 2, Interesting

How is it censorship for use by powerful people? The law doesn't even protect powerful people - the law as it stands weighs the right to privacy against the public interest and politicians are at an inherent disadvantage because the public interest weighs more heavily against them than it does your average Joe on the street.

You'll have a hard time arguing that it's in the public interest that Joe's drug snorting photos from 20 years ago when he was young and stupid should stay up for all to see, but in contrast it's very much in the public interest to keep photos of a politician snorting drugs when they're meant to be enacting policy on drugs and narcotics policing for example.

I'll be clear here - this is explicit in the law, this isn't just my interpretation or speculation, the law is written specifically so this is the case, therefore you're wrong to say it's only for powerful people, on the contrary, it's designed explicitly for the little guy, so that mistakes they made some time ago don't have to ruin their life, whilst making it impossible for dodgy politicians to also take advantage of it. This isn't your typical badly written and easily abused law, it's actually pretty decent. It's one of those rare exceptions.

"The only issue is how the info is used"

That's actually what the law does - it doesn't allow removal of say, newspaper articles. It does however allow the removal of links to such articles. The articles themselves are public record, the links to such articles are just Google making use of public record to make money pointing to the articles.

I'm anti-censorship, but I'm also pro-privacy. This is one of those cases where they've actually got the balance right.

Re:Censorship by Psyborgue · 2014-05-13 03:39 · Score: 2

Even if it's true? You're asking for a world without natural consequences. Fool.

Re:Mario Costeja González by Psyborgue · 2014-05-13 03:54 · Score: 2

But what about *my speech*? I have a website about a woman who refers kids to abusive programs to "help" them. The owner of one of the programs she sent kids to threw kids down stairs and pled no contest in court to charges of child abuse. She refers kids to programs for kickbacks, just as that judge in PA did, but nothing she has done is technically legal, so I felt that a website would help warn others about her.

Does her right to "privacy" include the right to hide her current bad actions and prevent *my speech* from being read by others? You are also mistaken about the US view speech. Defamation can indeed get you sued. However, we in the US believe in due process. In other words, something is not defamatory unless it has been judged to be so in court.

Also, you're splitting hairs about the Google results. It's like arguing that a government modifying DNS records to censor websites isn't really censorship because you can still type in the IP address. If you do something that prevents 99% of people from finding a piece of information, it's censorship no matter what you want to call it.

Re:Censorship by Br00se · 2014-05-13 04:39 · Score: 2

Then how do you justify the statement, "as soon as you take data from public record and make it searchable then it's not public record any more." ?

I don't follow your reasoning. How does anything that becomes a part of the public record stop being public? I can understand correcting the record if there are errors, corrections add to the record. But, I don't see how subtracting data is ever a good thing.

Re:Censorship by DMUTPeregrine · 2014-05-13 14:55 · Score: 2

They're a legal document database. They index court decisions, filings, laws, etc.

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Not a sentence!

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EU Court of Justice Paves Way For "Right To Be Forgotten" Online

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