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EU Court to Rule On 'Right to Be Forgotten' Outside Europe (wsj.com)
The European Union's top court is set to decide whether the bloc's "right to be forgotten" policy stretches beyond Europe's borders, a test of how far national laws can -- or should -- stretch when regulating cyberspace. From a report: The case stems from France, where the highest administrative court on Wednesday asked the EU's Court of Justice to weigh in on a dispute between Alphabet's Google and France's privacy regulator over how broadly to apply the right (Editor's note: the link could be paywalled; alternative source), which allows EU residents to ask search engines to remove some links from searches for their own names. At issue: Can France force Google to apply it not just to searches in Europe, but anywhere in the world? The case will set a precedent for how far EU regulators can go in enforcing the bloc's strict new privacy law. It will also help define Europe's position on clashes between governments over how to regulate everything that happens on the internet -- from political debate to online commerce. France's regulator says enforcement of some fundamental rights -- like personal privacy -- is too easily circumvented on the borderless internet, and so must be implemented everywhere. Google argues that allowing any one country to apply its rules globally risks upsetting international law and, when it comes to content, creates a global censorship race among autocrats.
If the EU laws work outside Europe, won't China'a laws work outside of China? Why pay for the big firewall, they could just demand removal of all "objectionable" content! Be careful what you wish for....
The whole approach to this is screwed up. Why is Google in the middle of it? The correct approach is to bring the person complaining and the website hosting into court and come to a decision. If the decision is to prevent listing in search engines, then modify the site's robot.txt to stop any search engine from indexing the page. In the current messed up situation Google has become judge, jury and executer for the decision. In my opinion that is abdication of governmental responsibility. It is the judicial's responsibility to interpret these laws, not some panel of Google employees. Google on'y responsibility should be to respect the directives in the robot.txt.
The whole right to be forgotten thing is asinine to begin with.
It doesn't remove any of the source information - it just makes it harder to find - and makes the net less useful.
US has a handful of cases looking to do the same thing
A handful? The US is world champion in extending judgements beyond its jurisdiction. They invented the practice.
The right to be forgotten violates my cultural beliefs.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Have you ever been to Toronto? They actually have plainclothes police that go to public places and listen for people to make off-color jokes or talk about Islamic terrorism in order to fine them. Literally, if you express an opinion that is negative about an "identifiable group", you've broken the law there. It's so bad that people now have to self-censor even when they're just having a casual talk with their friends. Comedians and other entertainers also have to make really dull jokes there as well.
Why do I use the word Gestapo? Because this is EXACTLY the kind of environment that one would have experienced in Nazi Germany.
That's assuming, of course, that anybody would be insane enough to actually want to go to Toronto to begin with.
Captcha: idealism
Need I remind you that there's currently a German citizen, in New Zealand, without any ties to the US, having his assets frozen on behalf of a charge and conviction in absentia of a US court?
Cry me a river about other countries overstepping their jurisdiction.
What is this "right to be forgotten"? I don't think, it exists — or ever existed — nor should exists. My memories, what I have seen, heard, and otherwise experienced are mine, however and wherever I recorded it.
Suppose, technology allowed (wait, it already does!) to carefully erase human memories — would it suddenly become your right to demand, for example, your ex submits to wiping out his memories of your time together?
Would it be Ok for employers to wipe out the memories employees may have associated with the employment upon its termination?
There is no such "right", we all better stop pretending it exists.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Hollywood history strikes again.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
And there is no 'right' to be forgotten. The concept is indeed insane. Nobody has a right to erase a memory.
You're confused on the concepts here because of the poetic license taken with "forgotten." We're not talking about erasing memories from human brains, we're talking about removing personal data from the internet. From computers. Why on earth wouldn't a human have the right to have their data removed from the internet? What's so insane about it? I did it just today by deleting a facebook post.
You seem to think this is big government doing something evil rather than government trying to protect rights of citizens from big undemocratic greedy corporations. THAT is insane.