Dan Cooper and Teresa Portelli of Covington & Burling write:
On July 22, 2019, the Italian supervisory authority for data protection (“Garante”) issued a judgment involving the so-called “right to be forgotten”. The Garante’s decision explores the boundaries of this right in a case in which Internet users could access an article by using a professional position as a search term, whereas it was not possible to access the article merely by using an individual’s name as a search term.
More specifically, the case before the Garante involved a professional, namely the president of a cooperative, who requested that Google remove a link to online content about him accessible by Internet users. The content was accessible not by entering the individual’s name as a search term, but rather by entering his position as president of the cooperative, an association that serves the interests of members, i.e., social or economic needs or other general aims.
Read more on InsidePrivacy. The ruling is bad news for Google and good news for those who want a strong “right to be forgotten” or user ability to suppress search results about themselves.