The Federal Court of Appeal in the USA has just ruled that Google is not covered by exemption for journalistic or artistic work.in a 2-1 court ruling, Google which drives more than 75% of internet searches in Canada, which opens the door for people to demand that their names in any articles are made unsearchable known as the right to be forgotten.
Valerie Lawton, a spokeswoman for the Office of the Canadian Privacy Commissioner, said it is pleased the court agreed with its position that Google’s search engine service is subject to federal privacy law. “This brings welcome clarification to this area of the law.”
This legal case was actually started in 2017 when a complaint to the Federal Privacy Commissioner was made that an article about him in an article on the internet was causing him personal harm, employment discrimination and persistent fear for his life.
He wanted the information on him to be delisted and appealed to the Privacy commissioner, which subsequently addressed this complaint under the Personal Information Protection and Electronics Document Act.
Other countries in Europe have laws like this to protect people privacy of how their names are used, as well as in Canada’s province, Quebec.
This case will no doubt head to the Supreme Court of Canada and is obviously being challenged by Google, and Media Coalitions. This is going to be an interesting case to watch.
More importantly it signals the imperative for International Human Rights Laws to align to protect our privacy as we enter a world which is increasingly like the Minority Report, where everything one does is known and never forgotten.
Sounds Orwellian like and as Dr. Zuboff suggest in her seminal book, Surveillance Capitalism wrote, the technology giants like Amazon, Google, Microsoft, now OpenAI valued at close to $90B, have far too much control on shaping our society and our world.
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