Google Loses 'Right To Be Forgotten' Case (bbc.com)

A businessman fighting for the "right to be forgotten" has won a High Court action against Google. BBC reports: The man, who has not been named due to reporting restrictions surrounding the case, wanted search results about a past crime he had committed removed from the search engine. The judge, Mr Justice Mark Warby, ruled in his favour on Friday. But he rejected a separate claim made by another businessman who had committed a more serious crime. The businessman who won his case was convicted 10 years ago of conspiring to intercept communications. He spent six months in jail. The other businessman, who lost his case, was convicted more than 10 years ago of conspiring to account falsely. He spent four years in jail.

Comments

Do we trust the legal system?

[hcs_$reboot]

The guy committed a crime. He served time, repaid his debt to society. Shouldn't he have, then, the right not to be marked as a criminal forever, in front of the world eyes?

Re: Do we trust the legal system?

[WindBourne]

Are the records public elsewhere? If he is public in legal system, then no. Google should not be forced to do this.

Re:Do we trust the legal system?

[EndlessNameless]

That's not the real problem. This is the real problem:

"But he rejected a separate claim made by another businessman who had committed a more serious crime."

Google doesn't know what it needs to purge. That means a case-by-case review on every request, a potential law suit if the requester doesn't like their response, and potentially legal penalties on top of that when they're wrong.

The EU needs to make this simpler. They need to create a clear set of guidelines for what types of information must be "forgotten" and how a person can invoke their right.

Re:Do we trust the legal system?

[mark-t]

Of course, but that shouldn't give him the right to effectively remove any remaining evidence that the event ever happened in the first place.

The fundamental problem with the "right to be forgotten" bullshit is that it is an attempt to legislate what people are allowed to think about by censoring their access to information that will enable them to think about those things. It certainly isn't fair that society might judge a person who has adequately repaid his debt to society, but I would argue that it is far *LESS* fair to try and dictate what other people are allowed to believe or think about somebody else, even if those thoughts happen to be themselves, unfair.

Re:Do we trust the legal system?

[Major Blud]

The Judge has some pretty unconstitutional (liberal) logic applied here.

Considering that it's a UK court, I'd say it being unconstitutional is spot on, being that it's not covered by the U.S. Constitution.

This is 9th circuit crap.

I don't think this is in the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction.

"Right to be forgotten"

[argStyopa]

....is an Orwellian "Right to Erase History" cloaked (barely) in a postmodern "protect my feelings" camouflage.

it is one of the most pernicious and evil pieces of government legislation in human history - to assert that people have a RIGHT to employ the forces of law to rewrite what are known facts in favor of (empty set).

Unbelievable. The philosophers of the Enlightenment are spinning in their graves.

news paper

[DrYak]

yeah, putting this into practice would mean tracking and burning every single copy of every single newspaper that happened to report on the case, etc.

not gonna happen.
the guy should learn to deal with the fact that his name can be associated with the case forever (just maybe not on google).
but potential future employer/business partners/etc need also to learn that it stupid to count on such old information, the gus havinv served their time and paid your due to society.

The First Amendment, again

[mi]

(Yes, I know, this case was in London, where there is no Constitution, much less the Bill of Rights. That's irrelevant to my point.)

If, as we've held for decades, the First Amendment protects the right to publish even state secrets — however illegal their divulging by the original sources may have been — it certainly covers the right to publish everything and anything else one knows and has not promised not to divulge.