Skip to main content

Right to be forgotten: Google may flag up instances of removed links

As Google continues to receive around 10,000 requests a day from Europe-based Web users keen to exercise their “right to be forgotten“, a report in the Guardian on Sunday claimed the Mountain View company is considering flagging up instances where links have been removed by placing an alert at the bottom of a page of returned results.

Google already uses such a system for searches involving copyrighted material – for example, MP3s for music tracks – notifying the Web user of the number of links that have been removed from the results page following a request by the copyright holder.

Recommended Videos

A controversial ruling by the European Court of Justice on May 13 gave those living in Europe the right to be forgotten and have links to Web pages removed if the information contained on those pages is considered to be irrelevant, out of date, or inappropriate.

While Google launched an online form at the end of last month allowing Web users in Europe to request the removal of search engine results linking to sites containing information about them, the company is still working out how best to implement the system and deal with requests.

To be clear, should Google agree with a person’s request to have links removed, the Web page will stay online, but Google will on longer link to it in its search results.

The Web giant said last week that in the space of just a few days it’d received 41,000 requests for link removal, with one report suggesting the company may have to hire new workers to help deal with the deluge.

Takedown requests have so far come from a variety of people, including, according to the Guardian, “a politician with a murky past, a convicted pedophile and a man who had attempted to murder his family and wanted to remove links about his crime.”

The idea that Google may flag up instances where links have been removed will likely come as a disappointment to those whose takedown requests are granted as it would simply draw attention to the fact that there’s more content on the Web related to the individual concerned and would therefore likely motivate the person performing the search to dig deeper in an effort to find that ‘hidden’ content.

[Image: Lightpoet / Shutterstock]

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Pocket is about to close. Use this read-it-later app instead
A woman looking at her phone.

Read-it-later app Pocket is closing down in just a week’s time, so if you’re still using it, now’s the time to switch to a similar app.

As an avid user of Pocket pretty much since it launched in 2007 as Read It Later, I felt a little sad to receive a message in May informing me that it would be shutting down on July 8.

Read more
A coding blunder just ruined a moment of joy for lottery winners
Eurojackpot lottery slips.

Imagine the joy of being notified of a huge lottery win. What would be the first thing you’d do? Get the champagne in? Book a fancy vacation? Call your boss and tell him where to go?

And then imagine being informed that the notification had, in fact, been sent in error. Well, you can always send the booze back and cancel the holiday, but trying to convince your boss that you were just joking ... well, that may be a bigger challenge.

Read more
This TP-Link Wi-Fi 6 router is 45% off in early Prime Day deal
The TP-Link AX1800 Archer AX21 Wi-FI 6 Router on a white background.

If you're planning to buy a new router to improve your home's Wi-Fi network, the good news is that you don't have to wait for Prime Day 2025 to take advantage of huge discounts on router deals from Amazon. Here's an excellent offer — the TP-Link Archer AX21 with an eye-catching 45% discount, which drops its price from $100 to just $55. The $45 in savings will only be available for a limited time though, so you better act fast and proceed with your purchase immediately as this early Prime Day deal may disappear at any moment.

Buy Now

Read more