EU Privacy directive

[Arthur Rubin]

(I have absolutely no idea which subject this should be under, but....)

The European Court of Justice has upheld the "right to be forgotten" and ruled that Google must delete links upon request concerning private life. The Court also determined that companies are subject to the EU Data Protection Directive and that jurisdiction extends to companies that set up a branch in an EU state. The Court said that since privacy is a fundamental right, it overrules the economic interests of the company and the public interest in access to the information. However this is not the case concerning one's activity in public life.

If this could possibly apply in the United States (which it couldn't), it would adversely affect our "work" (well, Jay's and Demo's work; the rest of us are not paid, even indirectly) in uncovering past fraud of current fraudsters. Currently, it only applies to Google in Spain (and possibly the entire EU), but the "right to be forgotten" seems to be just what some of the people we are talking about would want.

[ArthurWankspittle]

I don't think this will be as wide ranging as some people think. The complainant was annoyed at a link to an article in a local paper which linked his name to a lien filed against a property he owned for some overpayment of state benefits or something like that. He settle the debt years back. His complaint is basically that the only thing that comes out of Google with his name on it, is a settled civil matter from over 10 years ago. For example, in England and Wales, some minor criminal convictions are not reportable after 4 years. i.e. you don't need to declare them on job applications etc. If you were able to search back through old online news archives and find someone who had a conviction from years back and started banding it around, I suspect you would be liable to at least a civil action for doing so. This guy hasn't even got a conviction.
Also, the ruling was to stop indexing the article, not as is being made out in some places, to "scrub the internet" of the details.

[Judge Roy Bean]

Privacy?

There is no such thing any more.

[Arthur Rubin]

Also, the ruling was to stop indexing the article, not as is being made out in some places, to "scrub the internet" of the details.

Correct. However, who among us has the ability to search through unindexed news articles for, say, van Pelt's history. (Unless someone has Illuminati or CIA contacts and is willing to use them publicly.)

I haven't read the full ruling interpretation (rulings can be appealed ....), and it's probably in Spanish or French, anyway, but, if Cryer were still alive and in Europe, viewtopic.php?f=30&t=96 would probably be unindexed by now, and, if we didn't catch the court cases along the way, we would not be able to reconstruct it.

I suppose the interpretation wouldn't restrict courts from indexing their own rulings, but one could make a case that WestLaw (which is owned by a publisher with a European subsidiary) might be forced to unindex certain litigants.

Also, doesn't scholar.google.com index court cases? Does it index European court cases?

[Judge Roy Bean]

IMHO, this may boil down to what constitutes being a "public figure," and I suspect convicted criminals are going to fall into the "public figure" category.

[Arthur Rubin]

IMHO, this may boil down to what constitutes being a "public figure," and I suspect convicted criminals are going to fall into the "public figure" category.

There is at least an implication in EPIC's analysis that a convicted criminal would no longer be a "public figure" after his (most Sovereigns, at least, are male) conviction is expunged, which is automatic in some countries, and can be applied for in some US states. Can Google re-index the unindexed articles if he's convicted again?

[ArthurWankspittle]

IMHO, this may boil down to what constitutes being a "public figure," and I suspect convicted criminals are going to fall into the "public figure" category.

There is at least an implication in EPIC's analysis that a convicted criminal would no longer be a "public figure" after his (most Sovereigns, at least, are male) conviction is expunged, which is automatic in some countries, and can be applied for in some US states. Can Google re-index the unindexed articles if he's convicted again?

Most sovereigns are usually convicted of driving without a licence....
and refusing to stop
and assaulting LE
so the motoring offence might theoretically go after a few years but the associated convictions won't.

Back to the original complaint, this isn't much more than a civil debt. I'd be pissed off if all Google comes up for my name is a 14 year old debt that I repaid 10+ years back.
Court records would always be there but courts already don't "publish" things like family court proceedings, victim's names in rape cases, divorce details, stuff like that. I would also think that any "guru" type publishing a book or process would count as a public figure.

[Kestrel]

This guy has a very fixable problem. If you want to have a better internet presence than a 10+ year old speeding ticket, do a few things that will get your name seen in better light. Set up a Facebook page. Set up a LinkedIn page. Volunteer at church or a charity and get your name on their website as the good guy in charge of whatever.

Then again, I wonder how many people he shares his name with. If he's like most common folk there are at least 10 other people living within 500 miles with the same name, and at least one of those 10 has a sordid past he brags about on the internet.

In America it's not unheard of to have a unique last name that was invented/mangled by the immigration office when one's grandfather arrived in the early 1900s, meaning there may be fewer than 20 people now who share your particular last name. I know a family like that; for them their internet presence is more of an issue because when someone Googles their names it's a virtual certainty that the only ones who pop up are in that unique family.

But in Europe, where your family name has been unchanged for a dozen or more generations? Give me a break.