shelphs Posted April 21, 2011 Report Share Posted April 21, 2011 The Spanish law of individuals to have "the right to be forgotten" allows citizens to control information about them. This law has been used by citizens, through their government and regulatory data watchdog, to get Google to delete search results to certain information on Spaniards. An example of one of the plaintiffs who is a plastic surgeon. In 1991 a criminal negligence charge was brought against him; however, he was acquitted of all charges and wrongdoing, but a Google search of his name only produces reports on his arrest and alleged wrongdoing. The outcome of his case - that he was acquitted - is not available, though, b/c no news organization reported it. As a result, the man argues he is unfairly treated through Google's search engine. Google disagrees that it is responsible to censor such information; rather, it argues publishers are responsible. I would agree publishers are responsible but not to censor it. Instead, it is their duty to produce all pertinent information, and so, they should produce reports of the acquittal. This law could lead to a dangerous precedence. Censorship in nearly all forms is bad. Free speech leads to free access. Censorship is not the answer, fully reporting on issues is the answer. Though the above example itself is rather innocuous, with a precedent set, ability to control information by citizens/individuals can become hazardous, esp. if such allowances are granted to corporations or to reports based on evidence and result in a conviction. Burying a story of alleged wrongdoing and an eventual acquittal is different from censoring convictions. How far does this right to preserve one's own image online go - how far can it go? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12239674 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scribblet Posted April 21, 2011 Report Share Posted April 21, 2011 Very interesting it does give one pause for thought. Considering the man's plight I have to agree that people should have the right and ability to delete incorrect or out of date information online. How that would be done I don't know, but this is reputation destroying data IMO so he should be able to refute it or add the resulting outcome. How about requiring the publications who come up in the search engines, be required to print the outcome of such cases. Wiki comes to mind here and the often incorrect information on there, but at least we can go in and edit but it doesn't always stay LOL Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GostHacked Posted April 21, 2011 Report Share Posted April 21, 2011 The reason his arrest comes up first is the way Google works. The most likely case is the trial/charges were a hot topic, and that is what people searched for. Just searching his name before the incident would have just brought up some information on him and his work. So the items searched most get put at the top. It's all in how the indexing is done from google. I would not expect any data to be erased, with the way google has it's architechture, it's damn near impossible, because the data is striped along huge banks of computers. All of the informaition and search results are duplicated and triplicated among huge arrays/banks of computers. To delete anything off Google would be a huge task. Even for those who work there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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