Google flooded with take-down requests after ‘right to be forgotten’ EU ruling: Report

Google has been forced to institute a lot of changes to its search operations in the EU after this week’s ‘right to be forgotten’ ruling by the European Court of Justice.   Now reports are surfacing that the company has been fielding requests for content to be taken down hours after the judges ruled, according to a report in the Telegraph.   The ECJ had ruled that the search giant must remove information deemed **"inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant”** when such facts are raised by its users. It would also have to remove information that may be deemed excessive by the courts, after a complaint by the users. Failing to remove content would results in fines.   Since Google only shows you links to actual webpages, which may have content related to the user, it would only be forced to remove the link and can’t really take down the webpage that displays the information.   Sources reportedly told the paper that Google is still at odds about how to deal with the ‘right to be forgotten.’ The company will need to restructure its European operations, dedicating personnel to clean up content when complaints are raised in any of the 28 European Union countries, even in those nations where Google does not have operations. So it will need to establish a broader presence, which will undoubtedly involve considerable expenses.   It’s not just Google which has to comply with the court’s ruling. Yahoo, Microsoft Bing and other search engines too have to fall in line with the decision. But since Google has the largest market share in the world for search, it will have to move more swiftly than its competition and indeed will be watched by users and the courts more keenly than its rivals.