After the ruling by the European Union in which people had the right to have information about them removed from the Internet, Google has begun the process of removing certain search results.
The Daily Mail reports the decision has been called the ‘right to be forgotten ruling.’ When people now search for someone’s name, a message shows up at the bottom of the page telling users the results have most likely been removed due to European protection laws.
The warning will now appear regardless what people search so it may not indicate that someone in particular asked for the links to be removed from the web.
Daily Mail also reported the MailOnline was given a statement from a spokesman for Google saying, “This week, we’re starting to take action on the removals requests that we’ve received.” The spokesman also spoke about how the process of removing links was new and they would have to take care of each request one at a time and they would “work with data protection authorities” as they continued to put the ruling into action.
The Associated Press reported that over 50,000 people had requested their information be removed so it will take time for the company to work through the requests.
While some critics are concerned that criminals and politicians could ask for their information to be removed, supporters reportedly pointed out that the court made it clear that Google should make sure they don’t get rid of links that would outweigh the public’s right to know in regards to particular pieces of information.
The ruling only affects Google search results and not other search domains.