Google Removes More Than 50 Links to Wikipedia Content

Wikipedia has revealed that more than 50 links to content on its website have been removed from Google's search results under the controversial Right to be Forgotten ruling.

In response to this development, Wikipedia has created a dedicated page where it will be posting notices about attempts to remove links to the Wikimedia Foundation websites, which includes Wikipedia.

The notices from Google, published by Wikimedia, show that an article about notorious Italian mobster Renato Vallanzasca has been de-linked in search results as well as an article related to the gang he led called the Banda della Comasina.

The majority of the links which Google will de-link in search results appear on the Dutch version of Wikipedia and relate to a Dutch amateur chess player called Guido den Broeder.

Another article relating to the Irish bank robber Gerry Hutch (nicknamed The Monk) has also been removed. Hutch now runs a limousine service in Dublin.

The Wikimedia Foundation told IBTimes UK that it is unaware of why the links were removed or who the individual was who requested the removal - which it said was one of the problems with the ruling.

Ruling

In May the European Court of Justice ruled that individuals had the right to request search engines to remove content which features "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant data".

So far Google has received over 90,000 requests involving over 328,000 links, with the search giant complying with more than 50% of the requests.

"The Wikimedia projects provide informational, educational, and historic value to the world. Their content should not be hidden from internet users seeking truthful and relevant information," the Wikimedia Foundations' general counsel Goeff Bingham said.

Bingham said that the ruling compromised human right and the Foundation was going to "reject this kind of censorship".

At the launch of the 10th annual Wikimania conference in London, which covers all things to to with the Wikimedia Foundation, its founder Jimmy Wales said there was no conflict of interest even though he is part of a Google advisory board.

"Google asked me to join because I had come out already so personally against the ruling."

Transparency Report

In conjunction with making its first public statement on the controversial ruling, the Wikimedia Foundation also published its first ever Transparency Report to detail the number of requests made by governments, individuals, and corporations and how many of those were complied with.

The report covers last 2 years from July 2012, explaining how many removal requests Wikimedia received, where they came from and the result of the people. The report says the Foundation's mission is to "provide free access to the sum of all human knowledge".

Wales categorically denied receiving any national security related removal requests which it may not be able to even deny anyway.

The report reveals that 56 requests were received in the last 24 months for user data, with just 14% of those requests complied with.

In the last two years, the company has received over 300 requests to remove or alter content on Wikipedia but the website did not comply with a single one of these requests.

Most of the requests came from the US with Germany, France and UK the next most prolific countries.