When Google removes a link from search results in France per Europe s right to be forgotten ruling last year, the company should remove those links on the global google.com as well, the French data regulator said today in rejecting Google s appeal.
Google said in July it was fighting the June order by French regulator CNIL because limits on free speech vary throughout the world. In rejecting Google s appeal, CNIL says that by failing to remove links from search results worldwide, the company isn t fully complying with the 2014 ruling.
CNIL s decision is just the latest development that shows the right to be forgotten question is far from settled. Europe s highest court last year ordered Google and other search engines to consider — and grant on a case-by-case basis — individuals requests to remove certain links from search results. Google says it has granted about 40 percent of more than 300,000 removal requests so far. But Google removes results only from its search engines with a European domain, such as google.co.uk or google.fr. The links still appear on google.com.
According to the Guardian, Google has no more options to appeal under French law, and could only appeal to the supreme court for administrative justice any fines it is issued for refusing to comply with the CNIL decision.
As a matter of principle, we respectfully disagree with the idea that one national data protection authority can assert global authority to control the content that people can access around the world, Google said in a statement to the Guardian.
Above: Google search screen grab
