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nailit | 19:04 Tue 10th Feb 2015 | Law
18 Answers
//Some results may have been removed under data protection law in Europe//
Can anyone enlighten me as to the above message that appears on Google when searching a name?

Some years ago a certain person that I know was convicted of rape and sentenced to (I think) 8 years in prison. Searching his name on the internet then, gave results pertaining to news sites and the local newspaper which reported this offence. (whose own search facility also gave articles linked to this person)
Googling his name now, now shows no such results although it does throw up a present court case that is ongoing.

Can you get certain search results removed from Google?
If you can, I'd be interested to know how, as typing my own (unusual surname) name throws up all my previous court cases that were reported in the local media.

Thanks.




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Question Author
Do you ever sleep Buen?, lol.
Thanks for quick response will have a look at those links. Thanks.
Question Author
Really low on dongle data at mo. Can you summerise for me untill I top up tomorrow and read the links? Thanks.
Nailit. The second link is a form you fill in with the URLs to the website/article you want removing.
The key part of the first link is this:
"The top European court has backed the "right to be forgotten" and said Google must delete "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant" data from its results when a member of the public requests it".

Using the form in my second link you can tell Google why you believe that information about you is ""inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant". If their legal advisers agree, they'll then remove the search links (although the actual web pages will remain, since Google has no control about the actual content of web pages).

Although the ruling doesn't specifically relate to the UK's Rehabilitation of Offenders Act, showing that the information within web links relates to convictions which are now 'spent' under that Act would be a powerful argument for claiming that information about you is 'no longer relevant'.
Question Author
Thanks ummmm, Youve got my name so youll know that typing my name (probably followed by the word court or something similar) will throw up results that are not exactly conclusive with getting on in life.
If a known rapist can get then removed from a quick search then Im sure I can.
Also note that, under tge Data Protection Act, it would be illegal for people to compile their own database, from trawling newspaper stories, "for their own private consumption". To do so requires the consent of every person on that list, which I very much doubt they'd give.

Local libraries might become suddenly popular if this Google pruning catches on much more.

Question Author
Thanks Buen, but Im alittle confused about 'actual' web pages. The actual web pages (on my local newspaper site) are no longer avaiable either?
Question Author
//To do so requires the consent of every person on that list, which I very much doubt they'd give. //
Hypo.. my thoughts exactly. I doubt if the victim in this case would consent to this.
For what its worth, the person in question was a cell mate of mine in the 90' s and I had some personal interaction after release from prison with this person. I happen to know something of this persons personal history.
The web page is still there but the link to his name has been removed. If the victim's name was reported you can try searching that.
@naillit

"results that are not exactly conclusive with getting on in life"

Whoever you learned that phrase from got it wrong. Should be "not exactly conducive with…". Second c is soft, like an s.

Only trying to help, btw.

Not the right thread to relaunch the rehabilitation debate but just wanted to say, if only your younger self had understood this sort of problem being possible.

Question Author
//if only your younger self had understood this sort of problem being possible. //
Agreed....
I'd no idea over 20 years ago that Id be sharing a cell with a future rapist or (currently alleged) brothel keeper.

>>>Thanks Buen, but Im alittle confused about 'actual' web pages.

When you click on a Google link it takes you to (say) a page on a local newspaper website about you. (i.e. you're no longer looking at Google content).

Google can't change what's on that newspaper's website (so if someone who doesn't like you contacts your employer and sends them a link to the newspaper website, which that person already knew about, that page will still be there).

However Google can remove the search result from their own website, so if Joe Public simply enters your name into Google, the link to the newspaper website will no longer appear.
Even then Google didnt remember everything Nailit
so dont feel too bad
My own surname is so uncommon that Googling it just googles what my relatives have been up to

However ... for example the disbanding of the west mids crime squad in the late eighties for corruption was a big deal

and yet if you read Geoffrey Dear's biog
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoffrey_Dear,_Baron_Dear
the disbander - nichty - nada
you will find very little about it

86 acquittals on appeal apparently

There is even case-law on how far back does it go.
that is
if PC Plod was fired for corruption in 1980 does that means his cases in 1975 are tainted. ?

Nailit you will thank God to learn their lordships answered that with a 'no'.
Question Author
Thanks
First...my cell mate (the one in question) was in for arson. Not sex offences....that came later.
Second...Buen, Using the local newspaper search facillity doesnt throw up any results either, results that previously came up on Google?
Some newspaper websites cull older stories from their websites by removing the actual pages carrying those stories. If that happens the story will disappear from their own search engine and from Google as well.

However some newspaper websites leave all of their news stories intact but simply remove the older ones from their own search system. In that case Google will still be able to find them (even though they can't be accessed from the website's own search facility).
Try a search with Bing, Dogpile, DuckDuckGo etc
Question Author
thanks Buenchico, will loom into this.

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