Will Google Give Americans the ‘Right to Be Forgotten?’ | InvestorPlace

The consumer rights group “Consumer Watchdog” is asking the Federal Trade Commission to examine Google’s security approach to the privacy of United States citizens.

Consumer Watchdog on Tuesday filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission, accusing Google of “unfair and deceptive” practices for failing to provide US users the ability to remove search engine links from their name to information that is “inadequate, irrelevant, no longer relevant, or excessive”. “Describing yourself as championing users’ privacy while not offering a key privacy tool-indeed one offered all across Europe-is deceptive behavior”.

According to its transparency report it has remove around 41 percent of URLs flagged under the European right to be forgotten. The customer rights group says that by Google declining to allow these privileges is uncalled for and deceptive, as well as infringes on the Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act. “Not offering Americans a basic privacy tool, while providing it to millions of users across Europe, is also an unfair practice”.

However, FTC chairwoman Edith Ramirez told Time last year, “An expansive “right to be forgotten” is not something that’s likely to pass Constitutional muster here in the United States because there is a First Amendment right to both access to public information and freedom of expression”. Such requests must be handled on a case-by-case basis and, if granted, don’t remove content from the Internet but only the links provided in online search results. We reached out to Google for comment regarding the Consumer Watchdog complaint but have not received a response. The “right to be forgotten” act that has been concluded in Europe by the top court.

“Without a doubt requesting the removal of a search engine link from one’s name to irrelevant data under the Right To Be Forgotten (or Right to Relevancy) is an important privacy option”, wrote Simpson. No reference would be available to anyone not even the authorities.