Google ordered to pay fine of 600 thousand euros in Belgium for not fulfilling the "right to be forgotten"

The Belgian Data Protection Authority ordered Google to pay a fine of 600,000 euros for not removing information about a citizen of the search results of the technological giant's search engine.

According to the official, the citizen asked Google to remove links to a series of articles with allegations that did not represent his political beliefs. However, the technological company did not accede to the request, denying it the right to be forgotten, one of the standards that are part of the General Data Protection Regulation.

Since the facts described (in the news articles) are dated, are not proven and could have serious repercussions for his life, the rights and interests of the citizen must prevail, underlines the authority.

In an international press release, Google says it will appeal the decision, adding that it has been working since 2014 to implement the right to be forgotten in Europe and to strike a balance between people's right to access information and privacy.

We do not believe that the case in question was in accordance with the guidelines of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) with regard to the elimination of newspaper articles from search engines, we think that it would be in the public interest to maintain access to the articles, explains one Google spokesperson.

Remember that through the right to be forgotten, established in 2014 by European law, European citizens can request a search engine to eliminate online information about themselves that is inappropriate, irrelevant or excessive or that is being used illegally. However, there are certain cases where the public interest overlaps when necessary.

In September 2019, the CJEU announced that Google would not have to apply the removal of links about sensitive personal information globally. The decision was related to a case that reached the Court in 2016 after the French Information and Freedom Commission (CNIL) fined, in 2014, the company 100,000 euros for refusing to apply the right to be forgotten in research outside the European Union. European territory.

To challenge the decision on the global application of this right, Google stated in 2017 that the extension of the rule goes against one of the basic principles of international law, stressing that the continuous elimination of information from the online domain "is an attack on the right that the public has to know "about other people.

The company contested the decision not to remove sliga-criminal or political references from the search results, as fulfilling that request may set a precedent for public figures to request the removal of references to their political associations and their criminal past, and may lead to "hiding" important information about people who represent citizens in society or who provide services to them.

In all, the technological giant has already received more than 947,821 requests to remove 3.7 billion online calls on its search engine, indicating in an online report that only 46.5% were actually eliminated.

Editorial note: The news has been updated with more information about the case. (latest update: 16h58)