Judgment of the European Court of Justice: Google does not have to delete sensitive links worldwide

Google does not have to delete links to sensitive information at the request of those affected worldwide, decided the European Court of Justice (ECJ) on Tuesday morning. Thus, Google wins a lawsuit with France.

The French data protection authority CNIL had imposed a fine of 100,000 euros against the US company in 2016 because it had not removed certain links worldwide. Google did that. As a result, the French judges turned to the Luxembourg judges.

The ECJ had already established in 2014 that citizens can obligate search engine providers such as Google under certain circumstances to delete search results associated with their name. This may apply, for example, if the information about private individuals is outdated or inconsequential. Now, in Luxembourg, it was about the intricacies such as the scope of the deletion: Is the deletion of such links in accordance with EU law valid worldwide - or only within Europe?

The search engine operators are not obliged to remove displayed links worldwide from all versions of the service, the judges decided now. However, companies have to delete them in EU countries and take action to prevent Internet users from accessing links outside the EU (Ref. C-507/17).

The ECJ limits the questionable "right to be forgotten" to the territory that has come up with this nonsense - no global cancellation obligation. pic.twitter.com/kaeoxgky6N