The High Court Considers The Right To Be Forgotten
On 13 April 2018, the High Court, in NT1 & NT2 v Google LLC [2018] EWHC 799 (QB), ruled against Google, in favour of two businessmen advocating for the right to be forgotten. You can find the full judgment here, but in this blog we explore the reasoning behind the Court's decision.
Right to be forgotten/right to erasure
The Court of Justice of the EU confirmed the right to be forgotten as an existing right under data protection laws, in Google Spain SL v Agencia Espanola de Protección de Datos Case of 2014: 317. The right to be forgotten is made explicit in the EU General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (GDPR) text. Essentially, in the GDPR the right is an enhanced right of erasure. The right is not absolute, which means that a controller does not need to comply with the request if there is a legitimate reason for continuing to process the personal data.
Case summary
Two separate businessmen brought cases, which were consolidated. Each case centred on the reporting of business-related criminal convictions that were spent and over a decade old:
NT1 was convicted of conspiracy to commit false accounting and tax evasion; and NT2 pleaded guilty to conspiracy to tap phones and hack computers of environmental activists who had made threats against him and his business. Both claimants requested Google remove links from searches to their names. The claims focused on breach Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (that is, right to respect for one's private and family life), breaches under the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA), and the common law tort of misuse of private information. Google relied on various arguments, including abuse of court process and the journalism exemption under the DPA.
The first claimant, NT1, who was convicted in relation to more serious offences than NT2 pleaded guilty to, failed in his claim. Justice Warby, however, found that the personal information with regard to the second claimant's (NT2) crime and punishment "has become out of date, irrelevant and of no sufficient legitimate interest to users of Google Search to justify its continued availability".
The Court issued a delisting order for Google to remove the relevant data and search links related to NT2. As Google had shown a commitment to complying with data protection requirements and had taken...
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