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Google Releases Info On 2.4 Million 'Right To Be Forgotten' Requests (engadget.com)
According to Google's latest transparency report, the company has received 2.4 million "right to be forgotten" requests since 2014, most of which came from private individuals. Engadget reports: Europe's biggest court passed the right to be forgotten law in 2014, compelling the tech titan to remove personal info from its search engine upon request. In the report, Google has revealed that it complied with 43.3 percent of all the requests it's gotten and has also detailed the nature of those takedown pleas. France, Germany and the UK apparently generated 51 percent of all the URL delisting appeals. Overall, 89 percent of the takedown pleas came from private individuals: Non-government figures such as celebrities submitted 41,213 of the URLs in Google's pile, while politicians and government officials submitted 33,937. As Gizmodo noted, though, there's a small group of law firms and reputation management services submitting numerous pleas, suggesting the rise of reputation-fixing business in the region.
Out of those 2.4 million requests, 19.1 percent are directory URLs, while news websites and social networks only make up 17.6 and 11.6 percent of them. Majority of the URLs submitted for removal are random online destinations that don't fall under any of the previous categories. As for the takedown's reasons, it looks 18.1 percent of the submissions want their professional info scrubbed, 7.7 percent want info they previously posted online themselves to be removed and 6.1 percent want their crimes hidden from search.
Out of those 2.4 million requests, 19.1 percent are directory URLs, while news websites and social networks only make up 17.6 and 11.6 percent of them. Majority of the URLs submitted for removal are random online destinations that don't fall under any of the previous categories. As for the takedown's reasons, it looks 18.1 percent of the submissions want their professional info scrubbed, 7.7 percent want info they previously posted online themselves to be removed and 6.1 percent want their crimes hidden from search.
I wonder how much that list is worth.
is still searchable from google.com so what's the point?
... should I have the right to have my crime 'forgotten'?
Isn't the point of being forgotten that Google doesn't have info on them?
Today they started screening out any results containing 'gun' in their shopping results. And I mean all. For a time, searching for 'Guns and roses' would turn up empty. They've "fixed" it at the time of this post.
A bit pendantic here: European(as in EU) courts can't pass a law.
It is also called forgiveness.
Based on the principle that we want to be better people than that. Which is measured by how we treat the worst.
In civilized states, our goal is to fix what made people murderers. Not knowingly breed even more through torture (like your prisons) or showing them that murder is perfectly fine if you have the power to make the rules (like a death sentence).
That means there is a maximum sentence, and programs *for* the murderer.
(On top of programs for victims [relatives], obviously, as they come first.)
In order to prevent the traumata from spreading.
I do not know if you can follow me, in how you feel. But please at least try.
Is Google the only goddam search engine on the planet?
Why is it always, "Google, Google, Google?" Did Momma always like Google best?
Is Bing a thing?
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
That is, if they are willing to forgive it in the first place, then it doesn't matter if they know about it... and if they weren't willing to forgive it, then demanding that records be altered or erased so that they can't find out about it in the first place amounts to unwarranted historical revisionism, and basically only wanting to avoid the natural consequences of one's past choices.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
If you're one of us that happens to have a rather "unique" name, it's astounding how much personal information is available in a quick google search. Searching my own name on google returns my age, a list of all my previous addresses for the last 20 years, a fairly complete list of all my relatives including my children. That’s just on the first page of google, I’m sure there is much more available on any one of the numerous “pay for personal info” websites around.
I know this is all publicly available info that anyone can find on their own, but in the past, someone would have to put in significant effort and/or money to get it. No one would bother unless they had a legitimate interest in me, potential employer etc Now any of my neighbors can know way too much about me in 10 seconds for free.
Can't wait until we all can tell google to fuck off and die. Google is one of the most evil of all the tech companies.
Europe's biggest court passed the right to be forgotten law in 2014
I know democracy does not exists in EU institutions, but courts do bot pass laws. EU Justice backed it.
And while we are there, it was not a law. National parliament vote laws. EU machinery produces directives and regulations.
Merriam Webster says:
Bing : Noun
A heap or pile
A heaping pile of WHAT is an open question.
I think I know how search engines work, basically.
Google is censoring the "hits," in search results when certain search terms are applied.
Google is not the custodian of the data and, therefore cannot delete the data at URL destinations.
Therefore, it is not true that "Google thinks, therefore the data is," or is not.
Even if Google does a surgical disconnect within its sphere and scope of influence, the data rests right where it was.
Am I missing anything?
I would suppose that, like the bots that capture deleted social media comments, someone could make money providing a searchable link database to the shit Google masks?
Thanks.
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
I hope Hillary Clinton site is on the list to be forgotten. Tim S.
To the point of being practically useless.
You know... like when the search result page says some results have been removed, and it links you to this useless chillingeffects page.
But how is it that none of the morons blaring out here thinks if this brutally obvious conclusion?
Like they would release actual data that they were ordered by court to remove. Like they wouldn't know what would happen to them then.
(Not that I support censorship of any kind. Or generally hiding away the ugly things, so they may thrive in the protective shadows, instead of fixing them. [Game designers, are you listening?])
When I realized that, it all became clear to me.
Every company tries their very hardest, to use the husk of a for-the-people government as a glove, to skew the market in their favor and ruin the competition. It is a mandatory result of profit maximization and infinite (exponential) growth sadly being the mantras of modern businesses.
They even get everyone to blame "the government", attacking both their competitors using the glove and the actual peoples' representatives in one blast.
It might be evil and ruinous, but it's beautiful, man. You have to admire their elegance.
Here's what's wrong with the "right to be forgotten" law: "politicians and government officials submitted 33,937 [requests]". Politicians and government officials are the exact people whose pasts must remain a matter of permanent public record.
... to address to any politician or government official.
while politicians and government officials submitted 33,937.
Have you or any of your associates ever submitted a request to Google to delist search results about you?
The right to be forgotten does not surpass the right of free speech. Tens of millions died in Europe in living memory at the hands of regimes that relied heavily on censorhip. Well over a hundred million live under a dictator who censors and kills journalists. It is to be denied government at all costs.
The value of it, whatever it is, is secondary to mass death and loss of freedom.
Don't want to imagine, anymore, a boot stamping on a human face, forever? You have no assurance from history you have licked this problem once and for all, such that you can toy with it under democracy.
I await my downmod from the censorious who ain't censoring and hiding opinions they disagree with!
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I feel that this is similar to file sharing, torrent etc or whatever way, that is a basic property of the free internet (except child abuse, which is a universal crime). Removing references to information by a monopolist search engine seems violating the philosophy of internet. (also like the fcc's net neutrality attack).
"Make sure you forget this guy, John Smith ... and this gal, Jane Doe ..."
Forgive but never forget.
Forgetting is what morons do.
But its way cheaper at the C4 show at the Airport Hilton on the weekend!