Google to disobey French ruling on ‘right to be forgotten’

Google will disobey a formal notice from France's privacy watchdog, which has demanded the company extends Europe's "right to be forgotten" online around the world, in a move that risks further legal action.

In a controversial ruling last year, the European Court of Justice found citizens have the right to ask internet search engines to remove embarrassing or sensitive results that include their name.

Google has accepted the judgment, but has a policy of stripping sensitive links only from European versions of its search engine. That means links expunged from Google’s European sites do not need be stripped from Google.com.

Last month, the Commission nationale de l’informatique et des libertés issued Google with a formal notice, arguing that links must also be stripped internationally to comply with the law.

Google said yesterday it will “respectfully disagree” with the watchdog’s demands, adding that it has asked for the formal notice to be removed.

"While the right to be forgotten may now be the law in Europe, it is not the law globally," said Peter Fleischer, global privacy counsel at Google.

He said there are “innumerable” examples around the world where content declared illegal in one country would be deemed legal in others.

"Thailand criminalises some speech that is critical of its king, Turkey criminalises some speech that is critical of Atatürk and Russia outlaws some speech that is deemed to be gay propaganda."

Mr Fleischer added: “If the CNIL’s proposed approach were to be embraced as the standard for internet regulation, we would find ourselves in a race to the bottom. In the end, the internet would only be as free as the world’s least free place.” – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2015