Striking a balance between what should be forgotten and what the public has a right to know is a difficult task.
Earlier in the year, Europeans were granted the right to be forgotten so it is now possible to ask search engines that outdated or irrelevant hits be removed. A month since its implementation, "the right to be forgotten" is proving to be a nightmare in logistics for Google. The company has received close to 100,000 requests for take-downs and have gotten around to taking care of half of those but new trouble is brewing.
European Union (EU) regulators are not pleased with how Google is handling the requests. This is in part to the fact that the search engine has refused some of the requests and, in part, because Google is informing sites whenever a link of theirs is taken down from search results. There is also the issue that Google is actually only taking down links from European domains. This means use any other search engine not based in Europe, like Google.com in the U.S., and the juicy bits that were requested to be forgotten can still be accessed.
Is Google not taking EU regulations seriously?
Not necessarily.
"The issues here at stake are important and difficult, but we're committed to complying with the court's decision. That's why we've also set up an advisory council of experts. These external experts from the worlds of academia, the media, data protection, civil society and the tech sector are serving as independent advisors to Google," said Google Senior Vice President, Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer, David Drummond.
While only Google is feeling the heat at the moment, search engine operators are being asked to give regulators a rundown of what is being done to implement the ruling. Information gathered will then be used to draft a series of guidelines that will aid regulators in dealing with citizen complaints whenever search engines refuse to remove links. If regulators get what they need by the end of the month, it is possible for a draft of the guidelines to be ready by mid-September.
The nature of take-down requests vary but examples that Google approved include a man wishing to have information implicating him in a crime for which he was cleared be removed and a mother requesting in behalf of her abused daughter that links showing the girl's name be taken down.
