The internet is a perfect place for people to record their actions and thoughts for posterity but this may soon change after a court ruled in favour of the right to be forgotten.

In a landmark judgment the European Court of Justice upheld a Spanish man’s request for references to his past to be removed.

The controversial ruling means that search engines like Google will have to block information, deemed no longer relevant by the individual lodging the complaint, from appearing in search results.

The ruling has pitted those in favour of stronger privacy laws against freedom of speech campaigners, who believe the internet should remain free.

On the internet, anybody should behave in the same way they would if their grandmother saw them or read about them

Michael Zammit Maempel, a lawyer specialising in data protection, believes an individual should have “a reasonable expectation” that a digital reference uploaded in the past be stopped from appearing in search results.

“If the search engine turns up something the individual did 10 years ago and the information has no relevance on his life today, should it still appear every time someone googles the name?”

This was the question the ECJ answered. The Spanish man’s name had appeared in two 1998 announcements in a newspaper for the sale by auction of a house to recover social security debt owed by the man. The stories kept re-appearing every time someone searched the internet using the man’s name and he asked for the newspaper to delete the articles and Google to block any reference to the links.

While the court turned down the request for the newspaper to remove the references since the original report was lawful, it upheld the complaint against Google.

Dr Zammit Maempel noted that internet search engines had until now escaped the onus imposed on companies to ensure data they collect and store be correct and current. The court upheld this principle, he added. “The ECJ is now saying that internet search engines also have the duty to ensure information they source and store on their servers is correct, current and up-to-date,” he said.

The European Commission has long been proposing changes to data protection legislation to include the right of a person to be forgotten and the court’s decision has given the move added wind in the sails.

But the implications of the ruling can be huge for internet users, according to internet computing expert Alex Grech.

While at face value the ruling could be seen as defending the individual’s right to privacy, it conflicts with the vision of a free, open and searchable internet, he said. “In this case we have a person who may be an innocent, ordinary citizen but if anybody can ask Google to remove traces of his digital footprint we could also have despots wanting to remove traces of their past,” he said.

Dr Grech said the risk of such a ruling was that it could increase internet surveillance and limit freedom.

However, he also noted the practical difficulties of implementing what the court judges ruled.

“What happens if I complain to Google over a post about me that is uploaded by somebody else and appears in a LinkedIn group?

“How should Google remove the digital reference?

“It can change the search algorithm but will this mean blocking LinkedIn completely from Google searches?”

Dr Grech acknowledged the permanency of anything that was uploaded on the internet but insisted people had to understand how the medium worked.

“It is almost a duty to become digitally literate. My maxim is that on the internet, anybody should behave in the same way they would if their grandmother saw them or read about them,” Dr Grech said, adding the ECJ decision was probably taken by judges who were not as digitally literate as one would expect.

Although the European Commission has signalled its intention to move ahead and strengthen data protection laws, it still has to be seen how the judgment will be implemented in practice.

Definition:

Google was listed as a verb in the Oxford English dictionary in 2006 and it means searching for information on someone or something on the internet.

ksansone@timesofmalta.com